Inflation

A Burrito Costs How Much?

Plus: The economy lost 23,000 jobs in July, inflation is outpacing wage growth, Trump is still mad about birthright citizenship, and more...

Eric Boehm | 8.7.2026 9:30 AM

Share on FacebookShare on XShare on RedditShare by emailPrint friendly versionCopy page URL Add Reason to Google

Media Contact & Reprint Requests

(pantherphotos12646976 (RF))

It's one burrito, Michael. What could it cost? We are deep in the summer news doldrums, as evidenced by the fact that the dominant story on Politics Twitter this week was a debate over how much burritos cost.

I'm not too interested in the specifics of the burrito controversy, but before we can get to what it all means, you need to know the basics. It started with a viral tweet from Andrew Kolvet, a spokesman for Turning Points USA, who claimed that a college student recently complained to him about paying $20 for a burrito. In the days since, seemingly every single faction and figure in the broader universe of right-of-center politics has some theory about why burritos are expensive or how to handle your household burrito budget. And Vice President J.D. Vance called political commentator Marc Thiessen fat, for some reason.

(If you're not terminally online and therefore still very confused, Reason's Reem Ibrahim has a nice rundown of the whole thing and the economic considerations at play.)

As I said, the specifics aren't that interesting because, on its face, this is all pretty silly. Burritos don't actually cost $20. If you're paying that much, it's probably because you are also getting the burrito delivered and/or being up-charged on a bunch of other things. It's a bit like sitting in business class and complaining about the price of airfare.

The Reason Roundup Newsletter by Liz Wolfe Liz and Reason help you make sense of the day's news every morning.

Δ

Email

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Email(Required)

SUBSCRIBE

I'm more amused by the fact that this has blown up on the political right. As Peter Suderman noted in this space yesterday, this is "really an argument between the right's domestic populists and more internationally focused conservative........

© Reason.com