The Price of A Healthy Diet

The other day I was talking to a good friend of mine about food, when a touchy subject came up. I said something about how I really only like whole wheat bread and without knowing it I had struck an emotional nerve. My friend started ranting about how there is no affordable whole wheat bread and how poor people cannot afford it and how they are stuck with wonderbread. Although this was something that in the back of my head I was aware of I realized that my access to fresh and nutritional food is just another thing that I take for granted in my life. The way our economy is set up mass produced food is cheaper than fresh ingredients. The more shelf-stable a good is generally the less it costs and generally the less nutritionally rich it is. An article in the Washington Post described why poorer people have more difficulties gaining access to fresh food.

Calorie for calorie, junk foods not only cost less than fruits and vegetables, but junk food prices also are less likely to rise as a result of inflation. The findings, reported in the current issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, may help explain why the highest rates of obesity are seen among people in lower-income groups.

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/05/a-high-price-for-healthy-food/

With many families and persons facing a time of economic hardship cutting back of the weekly grocery bill may be the first step to change overall spending habits. When it comes down to eating cheap, unhealthy food or no food at all, of course people are going to choose to eat. However it is exactly this unhealthy eating that in the long run leaves Americans prone to disease and the need for healthcare, only in this day and age access to adequate healthcare is also up in the air.

"People are eating cheaper, more fattening foods; care is more difficult to find; and as a result we're going to have more and more people presenting at a later stage of the disease process," says Roslin. "If you're concerned about paying your rent and making ends meet, it's very hard to think about the future implications of diabetes and other illnesses."

http://www.newsweek.com/id/194980

Now I know that many of you may be sick of me harping about farm subsidies, but the reason why unhealthy food is cheaper than vegetables stems from the subsidies. Cheap corn is processed into cheap additives and calorie dense foods that appear in almost all processed products. Without subsidized corn we would not have the food industry's favorite high fructose corn syrup hidden in so many things. If we subsidized the growing of vegetables and the processing of whole grains then more Americans could afford to buy that whole grain bread that their doctors are saying is good for their heart instead of chowing down on cheap alternatives and crossing their fingers that later down the road all will be well.