Erika Riffe, a postdoctoral researcher at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Library, moved from Florida eight years ago. She considers the Bay Area home and has been thinking of starting a family with her partner. But with the rising cost of living and grocery prices skyrocketing, the pair are digging deeper into their pockets to cover the essentials each month, and starting a family here has begun to feel out of reach.
“I’m almost 30, and I’m thinking of having a family in the Bay Area and growing old,” Riffe said. “But I don’t know how people that aren’t dual-income-no-kids can afford to feed whole families worth of people right now.”
Like Riffe, consumers across the East Bay have noticed grocery bills that are inching upward each month and have begun changing their habits and budgets as a result…