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Paychecks gone in a 'blink.' Rising costs on the minds of Americans
Daniel de Visé Rachel Barber Jessica Guynn Medora Lee Ken Alltucker
USA TODAY
July 19, 2026, 5:07 a.m. ET
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Esther Malkin is dipping into savings to pay the rent. Mike DeDivitis tapped his retirement account to cover repairs on his pickup. Kerigan Rosado is baking bread to save a few bucks at the supermarket.
American consumers are hard-pressed to remember a time when inflation wasn’t on their minds.
Consumer prices have spiked for five straight years. In that span, prices have risen more than 25%. In other words, a typical product that cost $100 in 2021 is likely to cost at least $125 now.
There’s little relief on the horizon. The annual inflation rate for June, 3.5%, was higher than the inflation rate for any month in 2025.
The inflation crisis began under President Joe Biden, in the waning months of the COVID-19 pandemic. It has persisted through the second term of President Donald Trump, fed by his campaign of import tariffs and a lengthening war against Iran.
USA TODAY asked six American consumers to tell us how they’re coping with rising prices. Here’s what they said.
‘Everything’s getting more expensive’
Mike DeDivitis, 71, of Rainbow Lake, New York, and his wife bring home about $4,500 each month between her full-time job as a historical interpreter, his part-time job as an environmental steward, and Social Security.
They still financially support their daughter, who is a junior at Pittsburgh State University. After paying their fixed expenses, DeDivitis said there is little room to save.
DeDivitis, a former postal worker, ended up needing to pull from his Thrift Savings retirement account when his pickup truck needed $2,000 in repairs.
Over the past year, he said the cost of nearly everything they buy has gone up. Their electricity bill has more than doubled. Their paychecks, however, have not increased.
“Car repair prices are getting very expensive. Everything’s getting more expensive, so it just makes things tough. We can’t afford to get a new vehicle at this point,” he said.
They’ve cut back on going out to eat, dining out about once a month instead of once a week. They buy off-brand products and look for sales at the grocery store. They’ve cut back on driving in response to high gas prices, though DeDivitis said his wife still needs to drive about 50 miles each day to get to and from work.
Making ends meet today is harder than it was during the Great Recession, DeDivitis said.
“I don’t think we’re doing as well overall as a country as we had been in the past,” DeDivitis said. “The economic situation is, I think, just going to get worse, and I don’t have a lot of faith in things getting better.”
$900k for a condo, not counting condo fees
Gas costs nearly $6 a gallon at the service station near Mary Mehrkens’ home in Culver City, California.
“I’m so grateful that I have a remote job,” she said.
Mehrkens, 34, works as a YouTube news editor. Her husband is a product manager at a tech company. He commutes, but not far.
They love their neighborhood “because we don’t drive a lot, and because we walk a lot of places,” a luxury in L.A., she said.
The couple’s biggest affordability challenge is housing. They have two good incomes. They would like to buy a house, or at least a condo. But even condos in Culver City cost “about $900,000,” Mehrkens said, not counting the monthly condo fee.
“We’ve saved the downpayment money, but that would be everything gone,” she said. “And then we think about potential layoffs.”
So, they rent. Their other big expense is childcare, $1,600 a month for their 3-year-old daughter.
Mehrkens laughs when she remembers thinking, back when she was pregnant, that daycare might cost $500.
“My husband and I, as our incomes have gone up, we’re racing with prices,” she said.
Food costs keep rising, too, Mehrkens said, especially fresh produce and meat.
“We try not to eat overly processed food, and it’s just becoming quite difficult to maintain that,” she said. “I feel like it’s almost cheaper for us at this point to go to Chipotle than to buy groceries.”
Social Security doesn’t cover her housing costs
Esther Malkin, 65, survived two rounds of layoffs before she lost her job as a regional sales representative for a global food company two years ago.
She never planned to retire this soon, but despite 25 years with the company and a long track record in corporate training and sales, she couldn’t find work.
A local affordable housing and renters' rights advocate, Malkin had longstanding offers to work for nonprofits after she left the corporate world, but those evaporated with government cuts and other funding woes.
At first, Malkin considered herself lucky. She had 10 months’ severance and health benefits until she was eligible for Medicare.
Then reality sunk in. Her Social Security check doesn’t even cover rent and utilities for her 750-square-foot house in Monterey, California. For the rest, she has to dip into her savings, her 401(k) and a tiny pension.
“Before I used to say, ‘What do you mean, you're on a fixed income? We were all on fixed incomes. If you have a salary, that's your fixed income,’” she said. “But it's different when you have a fixed income and Social Security doesn’t even cover your housing costs, let alone all of your other expenses.”
Malkin can’t help but worry about possible cuts to Social Security. Already the spiraling cost of everyday necessities like groceries, prescriptions and gas have forced her to get by on a lot less.
Gone are the vacations and dinners out with friends. These days, getting out of the house means gardening, hitting the gym or volunteering at the local animal shelter.
For years, she dreamed of getting a dog when she retired but now she can barely afford her two cats.
An East Coaster who moved to California more than 25 years ago and once owned homes in Miami and Denver, Malkin says she’s even thought about moving. But where would she go?
“At least before you had the option of going somewhere else that might be affordable,” she said. “That's pretty much gone.”
While retirement doesn’t look anything like she imagined, she says she’s grateful that she’s better off than many.
“At the end of the day, if you've got a lot of money in the stock market, you're doing OK,” Malkin said. “Everybody else isn't.”
‘I blink and my entire paycheck is gone’
Kerigan Rosado, 29, commutes an hour each way to her job as an administrative office assistant at Central Michigan University. Her husband has a half-hour drive to his job helping people with disabilities.
Rosado spoke to USA TODAY in April. At the time, she was spending $50, twice a week, to fill the tank of her Chevy Equinox in her hometown of Saginaw, Michigan.
Gas prices aren’t much better now, and everything else seems to cost more.
“We have some of the highest rates in the Midwest for electricity,” she said. “They keep raising our prices, our rates, our distribution fees, every year, and they keep saying it’s to improve the grid. ... But our reliability hasn’t gotten better.”
Rosado estimates she and her husband pay about $300 a month for electricity and gas, compared with “low $200s” a couple of years ago.
Groceries cost more, she said, pretty much across the board.
“A family-size pack of chicken drumsticks, a few years ago, was 99 cents a pound,” she said. “And now it’s a $1.30.”
In recent months, she said, “if I go to the grocery store and I don’t spend much, usually I’m walking out spending $100.”
To cope with rising prices, Rosado said, “I’m buying more stuff in bulk. I’m cooking more at home. I’m making my own bread, rather than buying a loaf of bread, because it saves a couple pennies.”
And it all adds up.
“It feels like I blink and my entire paycheck is gone,” Rosado said.
'Prices are insane!'
Groceries, gas, restaurants – everywhere Chicagoan Christa Engel looks, prices have risen. "Prices are insane!" she wrote in an email.
"Breakfast for two at a restaurant used to be $25, now it's $50," she said. "An extra-large cup of tea is almost $5. Bananas never go on sale."
Even good deeds have a price nowadays. Engel, 60, recently moved just outside Chicago city boundaries and discovered "you even have to pay to get furniture donations picked up!"
To stay afloat, Engel said she and her husband "eat at home more, get rewards as much as possible. Shop more frequently, so we only get what we need and don't waste. I really only try to buy things when they are on sale."
But tight budgeting doesn't alleviate the pressures. "I worry about my own finances because things are not improving," Engel said. "I worry that it can get way worse, and we have no control."
Even with the raise she received about a year ago, "I noticed the net increase, but it definitely doesn't keep up with the cost of living."
Mesa grandma worries about rising health costs for family
When it comes to rising health care bills, Mesa, Arizona, resident Peg Kilroy, 74, isn’t concerned about herself.
She has a private Medicare insurance plan through Blue Cross Blue Shield that covers most of her expenses.
But she worries about how family members will cope with paying for health insurance and medical bills.
“I’m fortunate enough to be able to have health care,” Kilroy said. “There are people younger than I am who are not that fortunate.”
Kilroy said her younger sister has an Affordable Care Act health insurance plan and her costs more than doubled this year. When Congress failed to extend the enhanced subsidies that expired at the end of 2025, average costs for ACA enrollees who wanted to keep their insurance plans soared 114% in 2026, according to KFF, a health policy nonprofit.
A June 18 survey from West Health-Gallup found fewer than half of adults said they believed they could pay for health care, medical appointments and prescriptions.
Kilroy said rising health insurance bills and medical costs are too much for Americans who are dealing with rising inflation and higher grocery bills.
“My nieces, nephews and grandkids – they’re all struggling,” Kilroy said.
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