The hikes in fast food prices over the past year is partially due to high rental cost and ingredient cost. Do bear in mind that inventory cost, labor cost and rental cost are just the basic stuff every retailer faces. But a franchise involves royalties and also getting stuff from assigned vendors which usually they dont really have any further means to cut cost. So if there is an inflation in the cost of operation, the franchisee will just pass the burden to consumers so they can still live comfortably.
As for usa, the cost of fast food do vary from state to state, county to county. Try having a big mac at newyork and you will know what i mean. Quite expensive compared to the some other parts of usa. (during my few visits there, i found the newyork bigmac really horribly squashed and snapped on with some yellowing lettuce, but that could be a coincidence though).
