“$30 for Just That?!” — McDonald’s Customer Slams Chain for Price Gouging, The Internet Agrees

McDonald's customer Jammie Kathryn (@xxxjamdizzle2.oxxx) was left cursing the drive-thru menu after seeing what her total for 6 items came out to in an order she placed with the popular fast food chain. She uploaded her disgust in a viral TikTok video that's accrued over 2.8 million views on the video-sharing application.

"McDonald's be price gouging the s--- outta their s---" she writes in a text overlay of his clip, which shows a digital menu screen at the drive-thru window that reads: "The Crew's on it, be right up!"

So what's her gripe with her order? The fact that it costs $30.36 for 2 Sausage, Egg & Cheese McGriddles at $12.38, 1 double patty Sausage Egg McMuffin ($5.50), and 3 Hash Browns for $10.17. Add in $2.31 in taxes and the meal comes out to the aforementioned price.

Jammie uses a sound where someone curses over and over again saying, "Ain't no f----- way," as the audio for the clip, but sadly, this is the reality in America when it comes to food prices.

Ever since 2021, there's been a tremendous upward spike in the cost of both groceries and food-away-from-home meals (restaurants/eating out) in the United States, according to the USDA. In fact, analysts believe that the rising cost of food will continue to spike into 2024.

Not only has the cost of living soared so high that many people are finding it difficult to feed themselves and their families, or even find a home for them or their loved ones to live in, the United States has found itself spending billions in overseas conflicts.

However, there are some folks who believe that fast food companies may be taking advantage of inflation in the United States and are using the current cost of living crisis to artificially jack up the prices of their offerings as it means they can move less product for more money.

There's also the fact that several fast food retailers seem to be moving many of their deals off of the standard pricing models on its menus and are instead, building these deals into their mobile applications.

McDonald's not only rewards customers with points that they accrue on every single purchase that they make when they make a purchase via the app, which they can later redeem for free or reduced-cost items, but the mobile application also contains a slew of daily deals diners can take advantage of.

However, this just means that if customers want to dine at McDonald's at a cheaper price, they'll have to sometimes be beholden to whatever the chain is offering at the moment, or they need to, at the very least, remember to scan their application whenever they place an order so that they can accrue the points necessary for discounts down the line.

Commenters who saw Jammie's post seemed to share in her shock at the current cost of the chain's offerings, like one person who wrote: "Remember when they would do 2 hashbrowns for $1?!"

Another seemed to attribute the rising item cost to the increased hourly wages that employees are enjoying as a result of attempting to get more people working in fast food: "Gotta raise the price when you have to pay 15-18$ to flip a burger"

Someone else seemed to think that paying all of that money for fast food they don't even find appetizing is an insane expectation from McDonald's: "$10 for hash browns that are NEVER crispy & ALWAYS cold"

It looks like there were other folks who thought that Mickey D's was out of their mind for selling hash browns at that price point as well: "I can’t get over the price of a single hashbrown they’re TRIPPIN!"