Price of Lumber Photo

Facebook fact-checked a photo showing the rise in lumber prices over the last year: Facebook is fact-checking a particular photo comparing the price of lumber in the Fall of 2020 to the price of lumber in May 2021. The photo depicts two piles of boards and each stack shows how much lumber a person could buy for $1000 at the time. The stack representing the price of lumber in May 2021 was less than half the size of the Fall 2020 stack. USA Today's fact check does not dispute the rise in lumber prices nor does it question, as some Facebook users have considered, the accuracy of price discrepancy. The Facebook fact checker instead claims that the post is missing context because President Biden is not to blame for the rise in prices. The post itself however places no assumptions of blame on any specific person or event. It merely shows the amount of lumber one could buy for $1000. Other photos and memes on Facebook demonstrate the exact same concept but are not fact-checked on the platform. Fact-checked posts lose exposure on Facebook feeds and ads as they are negatively affected by the platform's algorithm. According to Facebook, users fail to click through a fact-check interstitial to see the post 95% of the time.

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