Spaghetti in San Francisco

9 restaurants in San Francisco list spaghetti on their menus. The cheapest is Mr Pizza Man at $6.00. The typical price across town is $16.99, and the dearest we found is $23.10 at Haystack Pizza, so the two ends of the list are $17.10 apart, which is 285% more for the same dish. Of the 9 kitchens listed, 3 charge more than a dollar under the typical price, 2 sit within a dollar of it and 4 charge more than a dollar over.

We track spaghetti in 50 other areas and compare them all on spaghetti across United States. The typical price there runs $12.75 at the median, so San Francisco is dearer than most of them, with a lower typical price than 3 of the 50. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $4.90 at Pavone's Pizza in Syracuse, NY, and the highest best price is $15.99 in Jacksonville, FL. The nearest area with it is San Mateo, about 16 mi away, where the best price is $10.99.

Where is the cheapest spaghetti in San Francisco? Mr Pizza Man, at $6.00 on 2680 22nd St. The same dish reaches $23.10 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $17.10.

What should spaghetti cost here? About $16.99 is the typical price across the 9 kitchens in San Francisco that list it. Of the ones listed above, 3 are more than a dollar below that and 4 are more than a dollar above, so the typical price is a middle rather than a floor.

Is it cheaper nearby? The nearest area we track it in is San Mateo, about 16 mi away, where the best price is $10.99. That is $4.99 more than the best price here.

Why do the prices differ so much? We compare what each menu calls the same dish, and menus are not identical: portion, cut, sides and the kind of room you are sitting in all ride on the price, and none of that shows up in a number. Part portions and half sizes are kept out of this comparison, and a chain charging the same at several addresses is counted once, so the spread above is between genuinely different kitchens rather than the same one repeated.