Study from UW finds that the prices of healthy foods are rising faster than other foods.
Basically, in four years, the cost of stuff like pop, candy, and other high calorie/low nutrient foods has increased 16% in the Seattle area. Fruits, veggies, lean meats and such have seen their prices increase by 30%.
Pablo Monsivais, research scientist at the University of Washington’s Center for Public Health Nutrition (CPHN) and lead investigator of the study, says near the bottom of the article, “These new findings show that food cost may pose a barrier to people adopting healthier diets.”
Gee. You think?
It’s not like normal people with normal budgets haven’t been saying this for ages.
I would like to cordially invite all of you, “It doesn’t cost any more to eat healthy” folks to bite me. Maybe you’ll listen to freaking researchers as opposed to the people who live their lives every day knowing what things cost and what they can afford.
This entry originally posted at http://polimicks.dreamwidth.org/
Polimicks 
Pablo then went on to say “fire hot, water wet” and other obvious statements.
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Yeah, I know.
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No shit. Wish we had more time to make stuff ourselves: Like bread.
Hi fructose corn syrup in every loaf, unless you buy the $5 a loaf foofy organic stuff you have to go on safari for in the thuper thpeshul aisle. WHY? In Mexico they didn’t have any additives in their food because it cost extra to add them! Here … WHY?!
I’m lucky we have a garden and chickens, which takes care of eggs and salad (not that you have to worry too much about eggs), still it’s $10 a week for chicken food. We don’t eat much salad, and the stuff I cook regularly, like broccoli, we haven’t had much luck with, though the potato crop is promising.
The carrots… You can’t plant too many carrots. What doesn’t get eaten makes heavenly carrot juice.
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Yeah. We’ve been picking up a friend’s CSA shipment, since they’ve been out of town, and I think we’re convinced. Some amazing greens, peas and kohlrabi.
But yeah, it’s fucking expensive. When we started cutting HFCS out of our diet because of the Boy’s diabetes, it was mind-blowing what all it’s in. Bread, ketchup, and the stuff that doesn’t have it is totally more expensive, especially the bread. Like five times more expensive.
I miss the breadmachine from the old place. You threw everything in and two hours later? Bread!
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We love the CSA!
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It’s pretty awesome!
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“It doesn’t cost any more to eat healthy”
…IF you aren’t allergic to / can digest low-cost proteins like peanut butter and low-cost staples like bread, rice, and beans.
…IF you have time and knowledge to bake your own bread, soak your own beans, and otherwise cook from scratch.
…IF you have the time, space, skill and knowledge to grow your own fruits/veggies.
…IF you have the time, space, and equipment (freezer) to stock up on sales and only buy food at the lowest price.
…IF you have the discipline to stick to lower-cost options even if it means less variety, less meat, less dairy, etc.
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Yup. Pretty much.
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All corn products, (and thus HFCS) are heavily subsidized by the US gov’t — that’s why it’s so cheap. There are direct grower susbsidies, as well as the entire agribusiness infrastructure, including fertilizer and pesticides, built ultimately on oil (which is also heavily subsidized). Of course that means that instead of our tax money being used to to say… develop first class health care, we pay a lot of money to have super cheap food. Food that, ironically, isn’t all that healthy for humans, animals, the environment…
I do think that one of the ancient, and fundamental, functions of gov’t is to safeguard a steady and reliable food supply. Thus farm subsidies are necessary. I just want to see a system that supports sustainable, biodiverse, and healthy (as in real nutrition — not dietary fad) produce. From a systemic point of view, we can probably do this for the same costs or less than we currently spend. Meat from pastured, sustainably grown animals will always be more expensive than industrialized factory farmed animals, because it takes much longer for them to develop.
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I agree nearly completely.
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