Nice Buns!

The humble hamburger can be a delicacy too

- Renée S. Suen

AS ONE OF the few foods you'll find at both fast-food drive-thrus and Michelin-starred restaurants, burgers clearly are king. And while Americans eat some 50 billion burgers each year, "burgernomics" are international: The Economist magazine uses its Big Mac index to compare the purchasing power of various nations' currencies based on the price of the McDonald's staple, with the U.S. price serving as a baseline. (In 2022, when Big Macs cost $5.81 on average here, the priciest Big Mac cost $6.71 in Switzerland, while the cheapest cost $1.76 in Venezuela.)