How much more expensive an individual’s life becomes depends heavily on the individual lifestyle. Our inflation calculator shows you how badly you are affected by the current price increases in Germany.
Since the start of the Ukraine war, life has become more expensive in many areas. In August too, consumer prices rose compared to the previous year. As confirmed by the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) on Tuesday, September 13, the inflation rate was 7.9 percent.
But inflation does not affect everyone equally: individual lifestyle has a major impact on how much more expensive life becomes for each individual.
You can use our calculator to find out how badly you are affected by inflation. All you have to do is answer a few questions and you’ll get your personal inflation rate. The line in the middle shows the average inflation rate in Germany. Depending on your answers, it is then calculated by how many percentage points you deviate from the German average. We will not save your answers.
The methodology
The main purpose of the inflation calculator is to show which purchase decisions are causing inflation to rise or fall at the moment. The results of the calculator only provide an approximate classification and should therefore be interpreted with caution. The same applies to the loss of purchasing power, which we calculate for you. The inflation rate is not based on an exact calculation, it is just a rough approximation of your personal inflation. Factors such as place of residence and marital status, which have an impact on individual inflation, are not taken into account.
To calculate nationwide inflation (consumer price index), Destatis uses a basket of goods that reflects the German average and from which the baskets of individual households can deviate significantly. Different categories such as housing, transport and food make up different proportions of the respective total expenditure. Depending on how you answer the questions in the calculator, the weighting of these categories is adjusted accordingly in the background. So, based on your answers, we estimate how your personal basket is made up and weight the expenses accordingly.
The inflation calculator of the NZZ is strongly based on those of the “New York Times” based on, but adapted to Germany.
In the Destatis shopping basket, housing and energy currently make up the largest part of consumer spending at 32.5 percent. Other major items are transport (13 percent), leisure, entertainment and culture (11 percent) and food (9.7 percent).
The food and housing sectors are particularly affected by inflation. In the case of the latter, the higher energy prices are particularly noticeable in the heating costs. In addition, the prices for craftsmen and repairs have risen significantly. There are differences in the energy sources: the prices for heating oil have increased by around 95 percent, those for gas by almost 60 percent. If you use a heat pump for heating, you only incur additional electricity costs – their inflation rate is lower than the average. Electricity prices have also risen, but not as much as, for example, heating oil prices.
Because of the high fuel prices, both driving and flying have become much more expensive. However, transport inflation last month was well below overall inflation at 3.7 percent. This was mainly due to the 9-euro ticket, which made public transport far cheaper. In addition, the tank discount has meant that car journeys have become somewhat cheaper again compared to spring.
However, both discount programs expired at the end of August. It is to be expected that inflation in the transport sector will pick up again significantly in September. So if you only use public transport, you will likely be hit harder by rising prices again in autumn.
Nelly Keusch: text and concept
Florian Seliger: Data and calculations, text
Nicholas Dust: programming
Cian Jochem: Graphic design
Anja Lemcke: illustrations