CartCast — Real Price Intelligence for Every American

Food companies have tracked commodity futures for decades to set your prices. Now you can too. Free. No ads. No signup. Powered by USDA + BLS + FRED + EIA + HUD + Census.

Live site: cartcast.vercel.app

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What It Tracks

Category	Data Source	Coverage
🛒 Groceries	BLS + USDA NASS + FRED	55+ items, national + by state
⛽ Gas Prices	EIA Weekly	50 states + 50 cities
💊 Medicine	OpenFDA + NLM RxNorm	120+ OTC + Rx drugs
🏠 Housing / Rent	HUD FMR + Rentcast	25 major metros
⚡ Utilities	EIA + state averages	All 50 states
📱 Electronics	Aggregated retail	60+ products
🏛️ State Taxes	Tax Foundation 2025	All 50 states

How It Works

1. Government data APIs (USDA, BLS, EIA, HUD, Census) pull real price data weekly
2. Commodity signals from FRED identify price direction 4–8 weeks ahead of retail
3. State-level adjustment factors apply regional cost-of-living differences
4. Static frontend (single index.html) displays everything — no backend server needed

Data Sources

• BLS Average Price Survey
• USDA NASS Quick Stats
• FRED — St. Louis Fed
• EIA — Energy Information Administration
• HUD Fair Market Rents
• Census Bureau API
• OpenFDA
• Rentcast

Setup / Run Locally

# Install dependencies
pip install requests pandas

# Set environment variables (or paste keys directly in fetch_data.py for local use)
export BLS_API_KEY="your-key"
export USDA_API_KEY="your-key"
export FRED_API_KEY="your-key"
export EIA_API_KEY="your-key"

# Fetch data
python fetch_data.py

# Open the site
open index.html

Deploying to Vercel (Free)

1. Push all files to a public GitHub repo
2. Go to vercel.com → Import → select your repo
3. Click Deploy — live in 60 seconds
4. Add API keys as GitHub Secrets (see below)
5. The GitHub Action auto-updates data.json every Monday at 9am

GitHub Secrets to Add

In your repo → Settings → Secrets and variables → Actions:

Secret Name	Value
BLS_API_KEY	Your BLS key
USDA_API_KEY	Your USDA NASS key
FRED_API_KEY	Your FRED key
EIA_API_KEY	Your EIA key
OPENFDA_API_KEY	Your OpenFDA / api.data.gov key
HUD_API_KEY	Your HUD JWT token
CENSUS_API_KEY	Your Census key
RENTCAST_API_KEY	Your Rentcast key

License

MIT — free to use, fork, and deploy. Attribution appreciated.

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Built by a frustrated grocery shopper. Powered by public data your tax dollars already fund.