How this is worked out
Cook at home or eat out?
A meal at home against a meal out, in money and in your own time.
What your cooking time is worth. 100% treats cooking as work. 0% treats it as free.
What time at a restaurant is worth. 0% treats going out as a pleasure.
Food money only. The money cost is what the average American spent per person per meal, from the USDA food spending series: spending at home or away from home, divided by 365 days and the meals a day you chose, and by the share of meals eaten at home or away. The average meal out includes drinks, tips and snacks bought away from home, and the average meal at home includes food that is thrown away, so both are averages of all Americans, not of one household. The share of meals eaten away from home is the share of calories (17.7% in 1977, 31.6% in 2007, a straight line between), not meals or dollars.
The meals in 2025. The value of your time is your choice; change it above and the verdict can flip. Meals a day and the minutes at a restaurant are assumptions.
Your time. Hours at home come from the American Time Use Survey and two earlier surveys: minutes of food preparation per person a day (57.3 in 1965 and earlier, 31.7 in 2007, 31.8 in 2024), drawn as straight lines between, times 1.47 for cleanup and shopping. They are averages for all people, not only cooks. Time is valued at 100% of the after-tax hourly wage of a factory worker for cooking and 0% for time at a restaurant: that is your choice, not data. The 15 minutes of travel and waiting and the 3 meals a day are assumptions.
Food money plus your time. The share in the fourth line is the value of cooking time, as a share of your after-tax wage, at which a meal at home and a meal out cost the same. Below it cooking costs less; above it eating out does. After-tax wage is the hourly pay of a factory worker after federal tax, Social Security and Medicare, single, no state tax. Factory pay is the Census series to 1970 and the Bureau of Labor Statistics series from 1971, with a step of about 4% at the join.
In 2026 dollars. Each amount is multiplied by the consumer price index of 2026 and divided by that of its own year. 2026 means January to August 2026. Food spending per person in the files is an earlier edition of the USDA series to 1996 and the current edition from 1997, so part of the step at the join is revision, not a real change.
Your answer in words. In 1970 a meal at home cost US$0.43 in food and US$1.90 with your time counted; a meal out cost US$1.00 and US$1.00. Eating out costs less, counting your time. In 2025 a meal at home cost US$4.28 in food and US$13.52 with your time counted; a meal out cost US$11.96 and US$11.96. Eating out costs less, counting your time.
Some choices came from your profile.
US inflation 3.4% (August 2026, US Bureau of Labor Statistics)
How every calculator on the site is built, and what changed and when, is on How it works.