The Keystone State is being victimized by “Bobflation.”
A new website propped up by allies of Republican Senate candidate David McCormick shows incumbent Democrat Bob Casey’s constituents being crushed by spiking prices from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia and every place in between.
Prices for both John’s Roast Pork cheesesteaks and Primanti Bros.’ Pitts-Burgers and Cheese have risen around 30% since 2019, according to Bobflation.com.
A one-day pass to beloved Hershey Park in central Pennsylvania shot up to $60 from $39.95 five years ago — while the price of a six-inch Wawa hoagie increased to $6.91 from $4 over the same period and admission to the Allegheny Forest doubled to $10.
The price of household goods like eggs, bread and milk rose more than 57%, whereas the gas that will get you to the supermarket — or to family vacation — is up 58%.
“Democrats Bob Casey and Kamala Harris recklessly spent YOUR taxpayer dollars, which has sent the cost of Pennsylvania’s most iconic products and experiences SKYROCKETING,” states the website, which was paid for by Friends of Dave McCormick, who is challenging Casey for his Senate seat in November.
“Bob Casey has been leading the fight against greedflation to lower costs for working families across the Commonwealth,” responded Casey campaign spokeswoman Kate Smart. “Meanwhile, Dave McCormick is getting fact-checked by Hershey Park, a Pennsylvania institution, for lying about their prices.”
Park reps had pushed back on X about the website’s price tag for a one-day visit, saying it was “not quite accurate — tickets are $49.99 5 years later,” in reference to its summer pricing for ages 3 and up.
A single pass for days valid all year long, however, is $59.99 for ages 9 to 61, and $49.99 for children ages 8 and younger or seniors ages 62 and up.
Vice President Kamala Harris earlier this month rolled out a new economic plan to federally set grocery prices and crack down on purported corporate “price gouging” — which was immediately panned by economists across the ideological spectrum and could add as much as $1.7 trillion to the ballooning national deficit.
Those economic policies — which include a proposed $25,000 housing down payment subsidies for first-time homebuyers and an enhanced $6,000 child tax credit for lower- and middle-income families — would not be deflationary, economists previously told The Post.
The experts also noted that grocery stores in particular have some of the lowest profit margins of any industry — and the accusation of “price gouging” was debunked in May by a Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco study.
Casey has nevertheless trumpeted the alleged penalties for corporate “price gouging,” which he had already introduced in a Senate bill, while producing ads with suited executives imposing sticker shock on the populace by slinking around a grocery store at night and hiking price tags.
“The corporations say your prices are up only because their costs are up,” the three-term senator said in his speech at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago last week. “They are selling you a lie. It’s in the bag with the diapers. Prices are up because these corporations are scheming to drive them up.”
Former Obama economic adviser Jason Furman laid into the Harris-Biden administration in 2022 for juicing the economy with trillions in federal spending through programs like its student debt cancellation push.
Inflation peaked in June of that year at a four-decade high, with consumer prices spiking 9.1% over the previous 12 months. The annual rate of increase has since dropped to 2.9%
Other economists have suggested that neither President Biden, whose administration added trillions to the national deficit, nor former President Donald Trump, whose administration also added trillions to the deficit, are to blame for the surge in the price of goods and services.
“In my view, neither Trump nor Biden is to blame for the high inflation,” Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, told CNBC last month. “The blame goes to the [COVID-19] pandemic and the Russian war in Ukraine.”
