Results of Hive PPP Index

A few weeks ago I did a post requesting inputs for a Hive PPP Index. The objective is to look at price parity for the same basket of goods consisting of 12 items, from different countries. I received 18 responses (including my own) from North and South America, Europe and Africa. Unfortunately I didn't get any input from Asia. I was hoping to get more data points, but 18 is a respectable number and I'm pleased with the spread of countries.

I have converted all the prices to USD, and the basket of goods ranges from $22.88 in Cuba to $127.38 in America.

At the top of the index at $127 is Washington state in America where @denmarkguy says "Making ends meet around here is always quite a challenge...". Texas @denmarkguy is $95, still pretty high, followed closely by the Netherlands in Europe. The average price from @denmarkguy and @denmarkguy is $83. The rest of Europe - Portugal @denmarkguy, Spain @denmarkguy , Serbia @denmarkguy , Czech @denmarkguy, Slovenia @denmarkguy, Turkey @denmarkguy and Greece @denmarkguy are all roughly the same, ranging from $53.87 to $66.48. At just $70, UK is slightly more expensive than the rest of Europe. There's around 20% price difference between Durban @denmarkguy and Cape Town @denmarkguy in South Africa, we'll take a look to see what drives that in a minute.

It was good to have a data point in Nigeria thanks to @fredaig. Likewise to @fredaig. and @fredaig. for your input for Cuba. Your country may be the cheapest of all, but I know it doesn't mean you are necssary living your life in Cuba because of the harsh economic conditions. Also thanks to @fredaig. from Paraguay, and country that doesn't appear on my radar much and I think probably not well represented on Hive.

5Gb mobile plan
The first item on my Hive PPP Index is a mobile phone plan. The mobile connection is essential for us to stay active on Hive. I asked for 5gb plan because I know some people may not have internet connection at home and the chain consumes a lot of data. Based on the comments to my original post, this is quite expensive in north America, both USA and Canada, but what surprised me was that it is also expensive in Paraguay. It is 149,000 PYG/USD18.7, and is one third of the total basket cost for Paraguay. Spain is surprisingly very cheap at $3.30, even cheaper than Turkey and Nigeria. Or maybe @mipiano is very savvy at looking for a good deal. There's a big difference between mobile prices in Cape Town and Durban in South Africa, and this is one of the biggest driver to the overall basket price between the two locations.

Next is transport. The price of petrol is made up of many components. Crude oil is a global commodity and will be the same for every country. What drives the final pump price includes things like duty and taxes, distribution and logistic costs, profit and exchange rate etc. For example in the UK, about two thirds of our petrol prices are fuel duty and our 20% VAT (more commonly known as GST in other countries). USA is known to have cheap gas prices and is confirmed by this index when compared to most of other countries. Gas is the only item where USA is generally cheaper than everyone else.

The next category is a basket of 5 basic food products - pasta, egg, potato, flour and mince meat. I've done a total for these items. Although we all have different diets and purchasing habits, I thought it would be a good idea to get a very rough idea of how much our food bill amounts to.

The cheapest for this basket of good is Nigeria, it cost $7.2 and the most expensive is Washington state in America, it cost $32.57. All the other countries cost just under $10 to $20. Let's take a look the individual items.

With pasta being a relatively low cost item, there isn't too much price variation between most countries. The outlier is Washington state in America, and is about double the price to everyone else, including Texas. I noticed when @denmarkguy sent his prices through, his pasta is Barilla, a good pasta brand from Italy, so maybe everyone else checked the price of a basic brand. Brand and quality can make a lot of difference to price, we have to bear that in mind.

Likewise there can be a big variation on egg prices depending on whether you buy caged eggs, organic eggs, golden yolks (they taste a lot nicer) and also the size of the eggs. Again going to America, as if things aren't expensive enough, the recent bird flu outbreak has made things worse, driving up prices. Most of Europe are around the same price, with Slovenia being a bit more expensive. Eggs in Africa are cheap, as is in Parguay. Good for these countries because egg are healthy to eat and very versatile ingredient.

I notice during Covid, the price of flour went up a lot in UK because everyone was baking at home during lockdown. Since then, the price of flour has remained high for us in UK. That's unfortunately, because for most other countries they're still very affordable. Greece and Portugal are the exceptions here.

Some very interesting data here. No surprises for who's at top here, @denmarkguy states "We have reached a point of pretty much not eating beef, anymore". Contrast this with Texas which has a strong cattle economy, maybe that helps to push down the cost of beef. The price of 1kg mince meat is relatively expensive in both Greece and Turkey, even more expensive than the rest of Europe, and 3 to 4 times more expensive than Czech.

First of all, there is no input for Havana because @mdrguez said "Now there is none in Cuba and if it appears that must be its approximate price" and her price was USD4. This seems very expensive, especially when compared to @brunettedev's 140 CUP/$0.44 so I made a decision to exclude the $4 from the exercise so it wouldn't distort the index.

It's good to see that, despite the high inflation in Turkey, potatoes are still very affordable. Potatoes are expensive in Spain, but @mipiano previously said they can be a lot cheaper at the markets. Please note, in my initial post, I asked for prices where you would normally buy them and not the cheapest, so this is a good reflection of your cost of living.

The following items are more of lifestyle luxuries

There is quite a big variation here, and that could be down to how I asked the question - not very specific. For example @duskobgd's can of coke is from a bar/restaurant, that's explains why it's quite expensive. My can in UK is from a corner store, single cans are always quite expensive. And I'm guessing maybe some took a pack of 6 cans and divided by 6 to get a per can price. We're not doing a formal research here, so the variation is fine.

I always use this as a benchmark of how expensive a country is when I travel, but again there will be differences on whether you go to Starbucks or a local small cafe. In fact back in 2013, the Wall Street Journal created the Latte Index. It's similar to the Big Mac index, and compared the price of a Grande Latte across countries. For this index the cut off point seems to be around $3.50 with USA, UK, Czech and the Netherlands being more expensive than the rest. I didn't get a price from @fredaig for Nigeria as she wasn't familiar with this.

A night out to the movies followed by a pizza dinner can work out quite expensive nowadays. Let's see how much it would cost you in different countries.

Again, we have a cutoff roughly above and below $10. For Texas @greensandpinks said their last sit down pizza place closed a year ago, this is a pickup/delivery price, hence half the price of Washington. In fact, in America, once you add on 15%-20% tips the $19.50 will become even more expensive. There's quite a price difference between the two Cuban prices, again I'm guessing that's down to the different type of restaurants. Some places can charge you much for just because they have fancy decor or nice ambience. Turkey is the second lowest out of all countries.

It's unfortunate that cinema tickets are still so expensive nowadays. If you go with a friend that's at least $10 to $35, plus a pizza afterwards, it doesn't work out as a cheap night out. No wonder so many cinemas are closing down now, at least in the UK. The exception is Cuba, it costs practically nothing to watch a movie, but don't forget we're just look at the product price here and have ignored the wages.

And finally a pack of 10 can beer. In hindsight, I should have asked for the price of a 6 pack, that seems to be the norm. I don't know why my supermarket is selling beers in packs of 10. Anyway, not a massive variation here, other than the American state that I won't mention again 😄. Turkey is the second highest, @bemier says prices have doubled since last year. In Europe, Czech beer is cheap but according to @bemier these beer "is hardly drinkable" and as a Czech beer drinking he should know!!!!

As I mentioned in my original post, this exercise only looks at a snapshot of things. It does not look at income, and other cost of living such as housing, medical etc. For example, in Cuba, the average monthly salary is $7, but a 5 Gb mobile plan is $1.60 and a kg of mince meat is $4.60.

Also, it does not look at exchange rate or inflation. It could be that some of the data I received 3 weeks ago is already out of date. In Turkey, inflation is 40% and @bemier doesn't believe this is the true figure. I have been looking at Turkish lira exchange rates recently as I was supposed to go there tomorrow (had to cancel my trip now) and the exchange rate has gone up by 5% over 2 weeks. Great for tourists but not good for the locals.

For me, this exercise has given me a better understanding about other parts of the world, and roughly what their cost of living is like. It's not the full story, but it's a start to learn more about others, and that's very important for a global platform like Hive.

Edited : to include Portugal which I missed out earlier on. Also, I will be sharing 5% beneficiary rewards to each of the 17 contributors. This will be done manually after post payout as I can only add 8 users as beneficiaries.