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Food Dollar - Documentation

This page provides the following information:

Data Source

The Food Dollar is constructed using the ERS Agri-Food Economic Data System (Ag-FEDS). Ag-FEDS is primarily made from national input–output tables from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. These input–output tables include make and use tables that describe how industries make and use commodities by purchasing and selling goods and services to other industries. Ag-FEDS also incorporates various ERS data to further refine the classification of food in the national system of accounts. Underlying Data (Ag-FEDS) provides additional details on Ag-FEDS.

Data Coverage

The Food Dollar provides national annual data for 2007–24 for 47 Food Dollar accounts:

  • 6 aggregated accounts for food, food at home, food away from home, alcohol, alcohol at home, and alcohol away from home
  • 28 food-at-home product accounts
  • 7 food-away-from-home outlet accounts
  • 3 alcohol-at-home product accounts
  • 3 alcohol-away-from outlet home accounts

Each Food Dollar account summarizes the total spending by source of production (i.e., domestic versus imported food) and three bills breaking down different concepts of the agri-food supply chain. Values are reported as millions of dollars and cents per domestic food dollar:

  • Total spending: Total food dollars are split between two categories.
    • Domestic food dollars
    • Imported food dollars
  • Marketing bill: The marketing bill divides domestic food dollars into farm and marketing portions. The term “value” is used when referring to millions of dollars, and “shares” when referring to cents per food dollar.
    • Farm value, farm share
    • Marketing value, marketing share: Post-farm activities that transform farm commodities into food products
  • Industry group bill: The industry group bill consists of 13 industry groups (categories) which may be grouped into broader sectors.
    • Agriculture
      • Agribusiness, which consists of farm inputs purchased from non-farm establishments
      • Crops
      • Livestock
      • Forestry, fishing, and agricultural services
    • Food processing
    • Transportation and trade
      • Transportation and storage
      • Food wholesale
      • Food retail
    • Food services
    • Energy
    • Business services
      • Finance and insurance
      • Legal and accounting
      • Advertising
  • Primary factor bill: The primary factor bill divides a domestic food dollar into four categories.
    • Salary and benefits
    • Property income
    • Output taxes
    • Imported inputs

Methods

The Food Dollar identifies 13 industry groups in the agri-food supply chain and uses data and multipliers from Ag-FEDS to compute the total value added by each industry group, as well as value added from sales of farm commodities linked to finished food products. Food dollar shares are computed by dividing those values by consumer spending on food-at-home products and food-away-from-home outlets as listed in table 3 of A More Detailed Food Dollar: Enhanced Accounting of U.S. Food Costs. The same computations are performed for alcoholic beverages. A glossary of key Food Dollar terms is included in the users’ guide.

The specific equations that construct Ag-FEDS and make it suitable for use by the Food Dollar are available in the following ERS reports:

  • Documentation for the Agri-Food Economic Data System (Ag-FEDS): A More Complete Accounting of Our Agri-food Economy (Report No. TB-1973)
  • Documentation for the Agri-Food Economic Data System (Ag-FEDS): Multiplier Model Applications (Report No. TB-1974)

The Food Dollar multiplier model is also documented in Documentation for the Agri-Food Economic Data System (Ag-FEDS): Multiplier Model Applications. The model uses Ag-FEDS to compute the data for the three Food Dollar bills.

Total food dollars, or total food spending that includes the value of directly imported food, is computed as the sum of each Food Dollar account (column) of Ag-FEDS. Domestic production is computed by tracing the use of farm commodities in final demand and removing the value of directly imported food from total food dollars.

The farm share of the marketing bill is the value of farm commodities relative to total domestic production. It is calculated by dividing the total farm commodity value by total domestic production for an account. The marketing share is the value of marketing services related to domestic production. It is calculated by subtracting the farm share in cents per food dollar from 100 cents.

The industry group bill is tabulated by summing the value added by all supply chain industries in each group. For example, the contribution from the transportation and storage industry group is the sum of value added by rail, truck, air, and storage industries. A special case is agribusiness, which is defined as the inputs purchased by farm establishments from industries not elsewhere classified into an industry group.

The primary factor bill attributes the value added by labor (salaries and benefits), capital (property income), output taxes, and imported inputs for all commodities used to fulfill the final demand for an account. For example, the bakery products at home account contains the bread and bakery product manufacturing commodity. The primary factor bill sums up all the labor used at bakeries as well as the labor used to make the commodities used by the bakeries (e.g., grain farming, flour milling, and malt manufacturing).

Strengths and Limitations

The Food Dollar provides data on domestic food spending and the costs of producing the food along the supply chain by three different supply chain concepts. These costs, in millions of dollars or as cents per domestic food dollar, are representative of the supply chain for that category, or account. As the Food Dollar uses national data, the values are averages across all markets and items that fall within those categories, and these averages may not describe all items within each category or market.

The data provided by the Food Dollar, including the farm share from the marketing bill and the industry group shares of value added from the industry group bill, represent averages for all farms and all industries in the domestic food system. They do not necessarily correspond with the profitability or net income of those entities, and do not include data on the production of commodities used outside of the domestic food system.

Resources

More details on Ag-FEDS can be found on Underlying Data (Ag-FEDS). The following ERS reports provide the specifics of how the data are integrated into the data system:

The Food Dollar, via Ag-FEDS, incorporates data from three ERS data products. More details on Ag-FEDS can be found on Underlying Data (Ag-FEDS). The following ERS reports provide the specifics of how the data are integrated into the data system:

  • Food Expenditure Series measures the U.S. food system by quantifying the value of food acquired in the United States by type of product, outlet, and purchaser. Ag-FEDS and the Food Dollar incorporate the total national expenditures for food at home, food away from home, alcohol at home, and alcohol away from home from the Food Expenditure Series. Further, they use the Food Expenditure Series’ totals for the food-away-from-home by outlet detail such as food sales at full-service restaurants.
  • Meat Price Spreads provides average prices at the farm, wholesale, and retail stages of the marketing chain for all the meat produced by Choice-grade steers and hogs. Ag-FEDS and the Food Dollar use the Meat Price Spreads data on beef and pork to assign a farm commodity value for beef and pork per dollar of domestically produced beef and pork. This allows Ag-FEDS to be consistent with Meat Price Spreads data. The resulting farm shares for Xf1103 beef and Xf1104 pork in the Food Dollar differ because of the Food Dollar’s inclusion of the use of farm commodities by nonfarm industries that support the agri-food supply chain. An example of this would be use of ethanol by the transportation industry that indirectly purchased corn to buy ethanol.
  • Price Spreads From Farm to Consumer compares prices consumers pay for food with prices farmers receive for corresponding commodities. Ag-FEDS and the Food Dollar use the Price Spreads from Farm to Consumer data on fresh fruits, fresh vegetables, and fresh milk to assign farm commodity values per dollar of domestically produced fresh fruits, fresh vegetables, and fresh milk. This allows Ag-FEDS to be consistent with the Price Spreads from Farm to Consumer. The resulting farm shares for Xf1108 fresh milk, Xf1113 fresh fruit, and Xf114 fresh vegetables of the Food Dollar differ because of the Food Dollar’s inclusion of the use of farm commodities by nonfarm industries that support the agri-food supply chain.

Recommended Citation

U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service. (2026). Food Dollar [data product].

Users’ Guide

The Food Dollar produces data for 47 Food Dollar accounts. Of these accounts, 41 are final demand accounts from Ag-FEDS and 6 are aggregations of those final demand accounts. Data are published in both millions of U.S. dollars and cents per domestic food dollar.

The contents for food-at-home product-specific accounts are determined by the source data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis’s (BEA) make and use tables as well as the BEA's Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) bridge table. The contents generally follow the North American Industrial Classification System (NAICS).

Accounts such as Xf1106 (poultry at home) and Xf1113 (fresh fruits at home) only contain the value of those items sold at that state of processing. Some of the value for poultry and fruits will be captured in other food-at-home accounts such as Xf1118 (frozen prepared foods) to the extent that they are used as ingredients for production of those items.

Glossary of Key Food Dollar Terms

Account: A category of food spending. It can be an aggregated account, such as Xf1100 food-at-home, or a detailed account, such as Xf1102 bakery products at home. Each account has an account code and three bills.

Bill: A bill is an itemized list of the contributions to the total market value of food by producers. This can be expressed in total dollar or percent terms (i.e., cents per domestic food dollar). Bills within the Food Dollar include the marketing bill, industry group bill, and the primary factor bill.

Commodity: Intermediate and final goods or services produced by industries.

Farm share: The farm value expressed as cents per domestic food dollar.

Farm value: The value received by farms for the sale of farm commodities that are linked to annual food expenditures, excluding direct and indirect purchases by other farm operations. Farm operations include establishments producing crops, livestock, forestry, and fishing products.

Food dollar: A representative dollar spent by a person residing in the United States on domestically produced food for an account. For example, the “Bakery products dollar” is a single dollar bill that represents all U.S. annual expenditures on domestically produced bakery products, and the “Food at full-service restaurants dollar” is a single dollar that represents all U.S. annual food expenditures at full-service restaurants.

Imported food dollars: Spending on finished food commodities that are imported from international sources and sold directly to U.S. consumers without further processing. The non-domestically produced portion of total food dollars.

Imported inputs: Food and nonfood commodities imported from international sources and used by U.S. food supply chain industries producing for the U.S. market. Their value contribution to domestic production is measured in the primary factor bill and by the importing industry group in the industry group bill.  

Industry group: A collection of establishments engaged in the same or similar activities (or related industries). See also: subcontractor.

Marketing share: The marketing value expressed as cents per domestic food dollar.

Marketing value: The market value of all post-farmgate processes of food supply chain industries that process and distribute food for final purchase. It is measured as the difference between food dollar expenditures and farm value.

Output taxes: The value of excise, sales, property, and severance taxes, less subsidies. Also includes customs duties and other nontax government fees levied on establishments.

Primary factors of production: Assets such as labor, machinery and equipment, physical structures, land and other natural resources, and intellectual property that are used or operated by an industry group toward fulfilling industry demand.

Property income: The pretax income or capital gain accruing to owners of nonlabor primary factors of production.  

Salary and benefits: The total remuneration, or compensation, of employees—including wages, salaries, commissions, tips, bonuses, and certain contributions by the employer toward health insurance or retirement plans. This remuneration also includes employer contributions to payroll taxes.  

Subcontractor: An establishment or group of establishments that do not appear in an industry group. Their costs and value added are attributed to the industry groups that use their services.

Supply chain industry: Any industry dedicating resources and/or processes towards fulfilling the demand for a product.

Total food dollars: Consumer spending on food, including food dollars and imported food dollars.

Value added: The proceeds from the sale of outputs, less the outlays for commodities purchased from other entities.