American Food Spending Compared with Other Countries A lot of Americans do buy quality food. But I know, for many middle-income families, they’re on the fence about whether it’s worth it. According to the Atlantic article above, America spends less on food than most other countries. Again, is it because food is cheaper in the U.S., or because we choose cheaper (and cheaper quality) options? America has one of the worst nutrition reputations in the world, so it’s worth looking into. We spend half of what French households spend on food. Cash is tight, but many Americans could afford higher quality food if we cut back elsewhere. We’ve been conditioned as a society to put food cost-efficiency over quality. Remember when the internet went wild over the kid who got through college without student debt by eating ramen every day? Praise his thriftiness all you want—I’ll take the debt and the nutrition! And those “value” menus at fast-food restaurants have us fooled, too. Haven’t we all, at some point, gazed up and balked at the $7 healthy salad, and chosen a few options from the $1 menu instead? It’s not until you consider that you’re paying $3 for something with zero benefit, versus $7 for something with benefit, that you realize the real waste was the $3 “value meal.” Food for Thought Not only have Americans been conditioned to look for cheap food, but we’re also told stories every day about the “essentials” of life—electronics, entertainment and material comforts. If we put a little more thought into our food and where the real “value” is, do you think we would start to change our spending priorities? Would pesticide-free apples and spinach start to become more exalted than iPads?
Posted on: Thu, 18 Jul 2013 21:38:56 +0000
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