There Is A Sushinomics Index And It Tells Us That Sushi Is Getting More Expensive

Wouldn’t you love to be part of the Bloomberg team that researches the trends and prices in Sushi across America? For the past six years, Bloomberg has decided to keep an eye on what it’s dubbed “Sushinomics” – the price of sushi rolls in 25 cities across the US.

So what does the 2017 Sushinomics Index tell us? Well, the price of sushi is going up… 2.3 percent over the past year. That’s significant seeing as inflation in general was just 0.9 percent, and even consumer prices only rose 1.9 percent over the same period.

The cost of basic rolls was highest in New York City and Los Angeles, followed closely by Miami, where prices spiked by a whopping 10 percent year over year. The  average price of a roll is at $6.99.

New Orleans is currently enjoying some of the most affordable sushi around, thanks perhaps in part to Louisiana’s booming seafood economy. According to the index, basic rolls in the Big Easy are averaging $5.40.

Costs like transportation, rent, and labor can have an impact on the price of a roll. However, some of the biggest increases could probably be attributed to volatile fish prices. The costs of sushi grade tuna, for example, have been rising due to increased demand worldwide. That trend seems unlikely to change, especially when it comes to the desperately overfished bluefin tuna whose populations have reportedly shrunk by 97 percent since the 1960s.