Cato Podcast Superabundance at Thanksgiving
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Nov 26, 2025 Marian Tupy, a Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity and founder of HumanProgress.org, joins Ryan Bourne to explore holiday affordability. They dive into how Thanksgiving dinner costs dropped 5%, thanks to time-price analysis showing goods are becoming more abundant. Tupy introduces the American Abundance Index, revealing blue-collar workers are seeing significant gains. Despite inflation concerns, they discuss why people feel worse and the importance of market reforms in sustaining living standards. Tupy also highlights advances in medical technology and celebrates the opportunities in the USA.
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Time Prices Reveal True Affordability
- Dividing nominal prices by hourly wages shows affordability more clearly than nominal or CPI comparisons.
- Marian Tupy finds Thanksgiving dinner time-price fell 45% since 1986, needing 1.76 hours now vs 3.2 then.
American Abundance Index Tracks Real Gains
- The forthcoming American Abundance Index divides CPI by hourly wages to track affordability across worker types.
- Between 2006 and 2025 average private-sector wages rose faster than CPI, lowering time prices roughly 10%.
Upskilling Delivers Biggest Affordability Gains
- Different worker trajectories show varied affordability improvements: blue-collar, entry-level, and upskilling workers gain differently.
- Upskilling workers saw the largest drop in time-price for Thanksgiving (about 75%), meaning huge relative gains.
