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Initial basket validated; five BLS series IDs corrected
2026-06-21 · Methodology v1
- Catalog-verified every BLS series ID before launch. Five candidate IDs returned data but for the wrong item and were corrected: ham and pork chops were swapped; cheese pointed at processed cheese (moved to natural cheddar, APU0000710212).
- Apples (Red Delicious) and margarine were discontinued by BLS in the average-price program. They were replaced with Lemons (APU0000711412) and Potato chips (APU0000718311) to keep a 24-item basket. Fixed quantities set at this time.
- Geographic scope set to national + the four census regions, after confirming BLS does not publish grocery average prices for individual metros.
BLS.gov cannot vouch for the data or analyses derived from these data after the data have been retrieved from BLS.gov.