Poor people are fat because they can't afford healthy food

[NobleSavage]

See it's what we eat and how we eat.

But who am I? I'm just a woman who did the research, changed the food she ate and the way she ate it, lost over a hundred pounds WITHOUT getting her stomach stapled or taking pills, beat back type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure, and can now walk stairs without being winded after 3 steps.

But what do I know?

Which was the point of my OP.

 

[Toni]

In the 70s, people did not grow up eating this shit. More mom's were home making supper and and eating out (as even this was still considered) was more of an occasion not the norm. Even with the onset of the working mom, was it not still her job to make supper as soon as she walked in the door, or was this just my house?
Further, and I think you would have to agree, kids still went out to play.

Here's the thing, In minority and poor white communities, moms always worked. Yet, you didn't have the obesity rates then that you do now.
Stayed at home moms have been using boxed and canned and frozen foods, IOW preserved and semi prepared foods, as staples of their menu planning for quite some time now and you didn't have the obesity spike in the 1940s, 50s, or 60s.

The use of cheap fats, sugars, and salt increased in the 1970s and so did the weight of the american public.

About exercise and the sedentary lifestyle

Definite contributor as well, but the food also contributes to the lack of movement. Much of the food available at the local supermarket is not what I call long haul food. such food gives you bursts of energy but wont get you through an hour of jogging or walking. The lethargy many Americans feel comes from the food we eat. And the portions size, and the need to clean our plates (which trains us to eat beyond satisfaction), and our aversion to drink plain water, we have to now flavor it somehow.

See it's what we eat and how we eat.

But who am I? I'm just a woman who did the research, changed the food she ate and the way she ate it, lost over a hundred pounds WITHOUT getting her stomach stapled or taking pills, beat back type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure, and can now walk stairs without being winded after 3 steps.

But what do I know?

It was considered to be a sign of being modern and also prosperous to be able to purchase canned and frozen foods and boxes to make cakes, etc. My mother embraced these with vigor and enthusiasm. It was also considered a sign of having 'made it' if the mom could stay home and raise the kids. My own parents grew up poor during the depression, and each lost a parent while they were still young children, so they knew the pitfalls of no safety net or social institutions to help out when a single parent or parent caring for a seriously ill and/or disabled spouse (as was the case for both sets of grandparents) while trying to raise the kids with little/no help and take care of spouse and keep a roof over heads/food on tables. While we didn't have a lot when I was growing up, it was a point of extreme pride for my father that my mother stayed home to raise us.

A couple of things that I think are enormously different than they were back in the 50's-70's: a LOT of people walk around all day with gianormous sodas and other highly caloric drinks in their hands all day long. Eating out is a way of life for a lot of younger people and generally speaking fast food and restaurant meals are far higher in calories than are most home cooked meals. When I was a kid, dessert was for special occasions like birthdays and holidays.

Yards were larger but almost no one had a riding lawn mower, and edges were maintained by a push mower or by hand clippers. Laundry was hung out to dry. Kids were sent outside to play and expected to not bother their parents but to show up on time for meals. TV was 3 or 4 channels and maybe an hour a day, even in summer. There were no videogames but there was pinball. People were more active.

Also companies didn't try to re-name vegetables and fruits to be their own name brands: Cuties and Wonderful Halos instead of oranges.

 

[Underseer]

Can you get us a link on someone making this claim?

I do know that what a lot of people do complain about is lack of time and access to full grocery stores in many poor areas and the reliance on cheap processed food.

For starters here's a primer fer ya: Te Grocery Gap: Who has Access to Healthy Food and Why it Matters http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/25/patricia-mccollum-charged_n_1624093.html

enjoy the disparities.......

Poor people choose to be poor, therefore they choose everything that goes with being poor, like not being able to afford healthier food. If they wanted to eat healthier food, they would not choose to be poor in the first place. They could very easily choose to be Paris Hilton, but because they are lazy and jealous of Paris Hilton for her great success, they choose to be poor. [/conservolibertarian]

 

[AthenaAwakened]

See it's what we eat and how we eat.

But who am I? I'm just a woman who did the research, changed the food she ate and the way she ate it, lost over a hundred pounds WITHOUT getting her stomach stapled or taking pills, beat back type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure, and can now walk stairs without being winded after 3 steps.

But what do I know?

Which was the point of my OP.

But I could afford to eat butter and not margarine. I can afford juice and not soda. I had a car to get to and from the better stores with the better merchandise and better prices. I could afford the Costco card. I could afford the freezer that allowed me to load up on meat when it was on sale. I live in a coastal county so I can go meet the boats when they come in and get fresh shrimp for 3.99 a pound and fill up my freezer. I lived in a safe rural neighborhood so I could go walking three to five miles a day and not worry about muggers, thugs and thieves. I had family support and encouragement. I have a college education so i know what to read and where to find it. I know how to do the research.

You want people without my advantages to live my life.

And that is silly.

 

[ronburgundy]

Prior to the 1970s we had fast food, we had junk food, we had advertising telling us how yummy it was and more disposable income to buy it. why were obesity rates lower?

....[in the next post]

The use of cheap fats, sugars, and salt increased in the 1970s and so did the weight of the american public.

In a sense, your second comment shows why your first comment misses the point about junk food. Adding cheap fats, sugars, and salts to prepared or processed foods essentially makes them "junk" foods. Thus, while fast and junk food existed prior to the 1970s it was far less widespread. Not only are foods that weren't junk, now junk, but junk food like McDonald's sugar and salt bomb burgers were far less widespread. In CT in the 1970s my family had to drive 30 minutes to get to the nearest McDonalds, and it was a big 1 a month treat. Now there are probably 30 of them within less that distance from where we lived, not to mention multiple outlets 20 other junk food chains that didn't exist back then, so it isn't a treat you have to work to get but an obstacle you have to willfully avoid 10 times on your way to and from work. Take the exact same people and change nothing about their psychology or will power, but increase the availability and relative prevalence of junk/fast food over healthier food and they will get fatter on average.
In addition, the concentration of unhealthy fast food outlets is much higher in areas where poorer people live. So, the poor people live in environments that require much more will power than wealthy people need to execute to avoid unhealthy foods. IOW, will power matters, but the difference between the rich and poor is not amount of will power they have but the amount of will power required of them given their surroundings.
It isn't that the poor cannot afford healthier food, but rather that they are surrounded by much more unhealthy foods. This "prevalence of unhealthy over healthy options" explanation for the rich poor difference is parsimoniously the same explanation for why people of every income level are much more obese today than in the past. All people are surrounded by more unhealthy foods than people used to be. That is why obesity is only very modestly related to wealth. 20% of the wealthiest quartile are obese, and over 25% of the middle two quartiles are obsese, compared to 30% of the poorest quartile. That means if you give the poorest people all the money they can spend (even from birth before they learn bad eating habits), 5/5 to 2/3 of those who are obese now will still be obese. IOW, income and the related environment only account for a minority % of the poor who are obese. For most of them, it is the same factors that make middle-class and rich people obese.

our aversion to drink plain water, we have to now flavor it somehow.

This is also true, and in a sense flavored water is a form of "junk food", even or especially when it used artificial sweeteners, which are nutritionless junk that alters metabolism and neural reward systems related to food. Naturally sweet things have tons of calories, so our brains learn to associate sweet tastes with high nutrition input, generating a sense of fullness in most people. Artificial sweeteners severe that association and our brains unlearn that sweet = high calorie. As a consequence, when we do eat high calorie naturally sweet things that brain signal to stop eating doesn't come or comes later. Thus, the prevalence of diet soft drinks, energy drinks, and artificially sweetened foods are just another form of the prevalence of junk food that combined with the reduced requirement of physical labor or activity in our daily lives are the major contributors to greater obesity.

 

[NobleSavage]

In addition, the concentration of unhealthy fast food outlets is much higher in areas where poorer people live. So, the poor people live in environments that require much more will power than wealthy people need to execute to avoid unhealthy foods. IOW, will power matters, but the difference between the rich and poor is not amount of will power they have but the amount of will power required of them given their surroundings.
It isn't that the poor cannot afford healthier food, but rather that they are surrounded by much more unhealthy foods.

I'm not so sure about this. There is all the junk you can dream of in affluent neighborhoods. And more tempting expensive junk.

 

[NobleSavage]

http://www.nydailynews.com/life-sty...tudy-dept-agriculture-study-article-1.1079412

Is it really more expensive to eat healthy?

An Agriculture Department study released Wednesday found that most fruits, vegetables and other healthy foods cost less than foods high in fat, sugar and salt.

That counters a common perception among some consumers that it's cheaper to eat junk food than a nutritionally balanced meal.

The government says it all depends on how you measure the price. If you compare the price per calorie - as some previous researchers have done - then higher-calorie pastries and processed snacks might seem like a bargain compared with fruits and vegetables.

But comparing the cost of foods by weight or portion size shows that grains, vegetables, fruit and dairy foods are less expensive than most meats or foods high in saturated fat, added sugars or salt.

That means bananas, carrots, lettuce and pinto beans are all less expensive per portion than French fries, soft drinks, ice cream or ground beef.

"Using price per calorie doesn't tell you how much food you're going to get or how full you are going to feel," said Andrea Carlson, scientist at the USDA's Economic Research Service and an author of the study.

For example, eating a chocolate glazed donut with 240 calories might not satiate you but a banana with 105 calories just might.

 

[ronburgundy]

In addition, the concentration of unhealthy fast food outlets is much higher in areas where poorer people live. So, the poor people live in environments that require much more will power than wealthy people need to execute to avoid unhealthy foods. IOW, will power matters, but the difference between the rich and poor is not amount of will power they have but the amount of will power required of them given their surroundings.
It isn't that the poor cannot afford healthier food, but rather that they are surrounded by much more unhealthy foods.

I'm not so sure about this. There is all the junk you can dream of in affluent neighborhoods. And more tempting expensive junk.

There is a far higher concentration of fast food joints in the inner city areas than the kind of outlying suburban, planned single family housing developments that more affluent people live in.

 

[NobleSavage]

I'm not so sure about this. There is all the junk you can dream of in affluent neighborhoods. And more tempting expensive junk.

There is a far higher concentration of fast food joints in the inner city areas than the kind of outlying suburban, planned single family housing developments that more affluent people live in.

There is also more grocery stores and supermarkets in urban areas. Every planned single family housing development I've seen has a strip mall within easy driving distance with all the junk food you could want. Maybe you have to dive a little further, but since you affluent it's easier to get junk. You can order junk on your phone and have it delivered.

 

[ronburgundy]

There is a far higher concentration of fast food joints in the inner city areas than the kind of outlying suburban, planned single family housing developments that more affluent people live in.

There is also more grocery stores and supermarkets in urban areas. Every planned single family housing development I've seen has a strip mall within easy driving distance with all the junk food you could want. Maybe you have to dive a little further, but since you affluent it's easier to get junk. You can order junk on your phone and have it delivered.

You're confounding the variables of unavoidable prevalence and proximity with ease of access due to great resources. I am referring to how much junk food is there in your face that you'd have to go out of your way to avoid. Those corner convenience stores filled with junk food that affluent people have to drive to are the places that poorer people live right next door to or even right above. Rich people need to drive to go get that junk food or pay someone to deliver it. Poor people need to drive to go get anything but junk food. Go to 10 liquor/convenience stores and 10 health food stores and you'll find that the avg income of those within a mile of the liquor store is much lower than the health food store. Go to the most affluent neighborhood in most areas and you won't find many blocks with a single convenience store or fast food place on them. Go to the poorest neighborhood in that same area and you won't find many blocks that don't have both a convenience and a fast food joint on them. Again, the issue is the poor people are forces to exert more will power to avoid these unhealthy foods, whereas wealthy people don't need to avoid them as much they just need to not go out of their way to go get them.

Of course rich people can get unhealthy food if they want it, just like they can get most things if they want it (including political corruption). That is why 20% of rich people are obese and why obesity is only weakly correlated with income. The question is why is it correlated at all, and the answer is not the difference in will power but the difference in the need to actively avoid the unhealthy options which requires more will power than merely not going the extra mile to get the unhealthy options.

IT is a lot like most other disadvantages people are born into, whether its being born to abusive parents or born with a slow metabolism. It isn't that its impossible for them (that they cannot "afford") to achieve better health or good parenting. But it does take much more will power and effort for them to achieve these things than it does for someone born with a high metabolism or good parents. IOW, it is a false dichotomy to view it as either they cannot afford to do it or it is their fault and a lack of will power. They could achieve similar outcomes as the more advantaged but it requires much more of them to do so than it does for the advantaged to achieve those outcomes. In fact, environmental obstacles often matter enough that even when the poor do have more will and put in more effort, they would still come up short.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

http://www.nydailynews.com/life-sty...tudy-dept-agriculture-study-article-1.1079412

Is it really more expensive to eat healthy?

An Agriculture Department study released Wednesday found that most fruits, vegetables and other healthy foods cost less than foods high in fat, sugar and salt.

That counters a common perception among some consumers that it's cheaper to eat junk food than a nutritionally balanced meal.

The government says it all depends on how you measure the price. If you compare the price per calorie - as some previous researchers have done - then higher-calorie pastries and processed snacks might seem like a bargain compared with fruits and vegetables.

But comparing the cost of foods by weight or portion size shows that grains, vegetables, fruit and dairy foods are less expensive than most meats or foods high in saturated fat, added sugars or salt.

That means bananas, carrots, lettuce and pinto beans are all less expensive per portion than French fries, soft drinks, ice cream or ground beef.

"Using price per calorie doesn't tell you how much food you're going to get or how full you are going to feel," said Andrea Carlson, scientist at the USDA's Economic Research Service and an author of the study.

For example, eating a chocolate glazed donut with 240 calories might not satiate you but a banana with 105 calories just might.

Agreed. I find the unhealthy choices are generally more expensive if you shop around and to a fair degree let prices dictate what you buy (don't put "apples" on your shopping list. Put "fruit"--and see what's a good deal this week.)

What I do see is the unhealthy choices are generally less work to prepare.

 

[Toni]

http://www.nydailynews.com/life-sty...tudy-dept-agriculture-study-article-1.1079412

Agreed. I find the unhealthy choices are generally more expensive if you shop around and to a fair degree let prices dictate what you buy (don't put "apples" on your shopping list. Put "fruit"--and see what's a good deal this week.)

What I do see is the unhealthy choices are generally less work to prepare.

Ramen noodles, anyone? Cheap, easy, low on nutritional value; high on sodium content. First choice of college students and poor people because of the calories/$1 ratio.

As noted in the post quoted above, cost of food by calorie is also important: if you have only a very small amount of money to feed a family, unfortunately, it is often the case that one does go for calories in order to stave off hunger.

Less work/less time to prepare is not inconsequential, especially for people who are juggling multiple part time jobs, small children, do not have their own car but must rely on walking or using public transport to get back and forth to the store and to work, etc.

Also important is if you have a reliable stove and/or oven and sufficient pots and pans. Hard to accumulate if you dont' have money. Or if you lost them in the last move. If your housing situation is insecure, then this becomes a real issue.

Then you get into kitchen basics that an average middle class family might have on hand: flour, sugar, eggs, butter or margerine, milk, spices, onions, garlic, potatoes, canned tomatoes, tuna, peanut butter. Cooking oil, basic herbs and spices. Rice. Beans. Pasta. All of which can be used as the backbone of a pretty inexpensive meal, if you have these on hand and can keep them pretty well stocked. But that's not easy to do if you are poor. Having helped more than one young adult offspring stock his/her first kitchen, it is surprising how quickly these things add up. Having basics on hand can make it much easier to actually put together a nutritious meal with little investment of time and effort or most importantly: money. Or having family who can help stock you up in the first place. Another luxury many poor people don't have: family who can spare a little something to help get you started or to help tide you over.

Right now, in my kitchen I probably have enough food that if I had to, I could go several weeks without visiting any kind of grocery store, so long as I wasn't picky about including fresh fruits or vegetables. Those would be gone fairly quickly, even with my fully functional refrigerator--a luxury not all poor people can count on. Or even not so poor. I've been in my kids' starter apartments and I know how much time/energy they sometimes invested in keeping just the right amount of perishable food around and the right kinds because well, the fridge wasn't that great and neither was the landlord.

Now, I am very solidly middle class. I remember very well when I first left home and earned very little money how hard it was to manage to pay rent and to eat every day---and I bought no convenience foods unless you count tuna in a can (a huge luxury for me--I could afford only 1 can at $0.79/week--and no mayo). My room mates and I pooled money to buy a pound of hamburger about once a month and made meat sauce for pasta to share. If we could afford it, which was not a given. Fortunately, I had only myself to look after and I wasn't worried about feeding a young child or someone with any kind of health condition. No meals out, period. Unless you count the occasional days when I had enough money to buy a candy bar and nothing in the cupboards at home so I just had a candy bar for the day. Not healthy and not what I wanted to do but hey: some days, I didn't even have that.

Like most middle class people, I can afford to shop around for bargains and to stock up when something is on sale. I have a car and can drive from store to store, and even make a run to a warehouse store to stock up on staples now and then. If I didnt' have a car or the ability to built up a cash reserve to fund such trips, I would be SOL as the kids used to say.

 

[credoconsolans]

Which was the point of my OP.

But I could afford to eat butter and not margarine. I can afford juice and not soda. I had a car to get to and from the better stores with the better merchandise and better prices. I could afford the Costco card. I could afford the freezer that allowed me to load up on meat when it was on sale. I live in a coastal county so I can go meet the boats when they come in and get fresh shrimp for 3.99 a pound and fill up my freezer. I lived in a safe rural neighborhood so I could go walking three to five miles a day and not worry about muggers, thugs and thieves. I had family support and encouragement. I have a college education so i know what to read and where to find it. I know how to do the research.

You want people without my advantages to live my life.

And that is silly.

Well said.

 

[NobleSavage]

But I could afford to eat butter and not margarine. I can afford juice and not soda. I had a car to get to and from the better stores with the better merchandise and better prices. I could afford the Costco card. I could afford the freezer that allowed me to load up on meat when it was on sale. I live in a coastal county so I can go meet the boats when they come in and get fresh shrimp for 3.99 a pound and fill up my freezer. I lived in a safe rural neighborhood so I could go walking three to five miles a day and not worry about muggers, thugs and thieves. I had family support and encouragement. I have a college education so i know what to read and where to find it. I know how to do the research.

You want people without my advantages to live my life.

And that is silly.

I want people without advantages to have a better life and that is not silly. If people without advantages have a better life, mine will be better by extension. Wanting my life to be better is not silly. 21% of medical spending is not a silly amount. Ignoring the data IS silly. What is the best way to get from here to there? I'm not sure, but cost is not the driving factor.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

But I could afford to eat butter and not margarine. I can afford juice and not soda. I had a car to get to and from the better stores with the better merchandise and better prices. I could afford the Costco card. I could afford the freezer that allowed me to load up on meat when it was on sale. I live in a coastal county so I can go meet the boats when they come in and get fresh shrimp for 3.99 a pound and fill up my freezer. I lived in a safe rural neighborhood so I could go walking three to five miles a day and not worry about muggers, thugs and thieves. I had family support and encouragement. I have a college education so i know what to read and where to find it. I know how to do the research.

You want people without my advantages to live my life.

And that is silly.

I want people without advantages to have a better life and that is not silly. If people without advantages have a better life, mine will be better by extension. Wanting my life to be better is not silly. 21% of medical spending is not a silly amount. Ignoring the data IS silly. What is the best way to get from here to there? I'm not sure, but cost is not the driving factor.

You want the data?

People have blamed the problems of poverty on poor people since poverty began and the only thing that has accomplished is the continuation of poverty. In modern time, societies started treating poverty as a social condition and actually reduced and are still reducing poverty rates as a result.

And yet certain people keep on trying to find ways to beat up on poor folks, to blame poverty on individual choice and not on economic, political, and social policies.

And BTW, I said that not credoconsolans

 

[NobleSavage]

I want people without advantages to have a better life and that is not silly. If people without advantages have a better life, mine will be better by extension. Wanting my life to be better is not silly. 21% of medical spending is not a silly amount. Ignoring the data IS silly. What is the best way to get from here to there? I'm not sure, but cost is not the driving factor.

You want the data?

People have blamed the problems of poverty on poor people since poverty began and the only thing that has accomplished is the continuation of poverty. In modern time, societies started treating poverty as a social condition and actually reduced and are still reducing poverty rates as a result.

And yet certain people keep on trying to find ways to beat up on poor folks, to blame poverty on individual choice and not on economic, political, and social policies.

And BTW, I said that not credoconsolans

Yeah, I screwed up the quotes.

Ignoring individual choice is as stupid as ignoring economic, political, and social policies. Ok, say YOU are appointed policy guru for poverty and obesity. I guess you would do nothing because it's "silly", but lets pretend that you wanted to to the job, what would you do?

 

[EricK]

I want people without advantages to have a better life and that is not silly. If people without advantages have a better life, mine will be better by extension. Wanting my life to be better is not silly. 21% of medical spending is not a silly amount. Ignoring the data IS silly. What is the best way to get from here to there? I'm not sure, but cost is not the driving factor.

You want the data?

People have blamed the problems of poverty on poor people since poverty began and the only thing that has accomplished is the continuation of poverty. In modern time, societies started treating poverty as a social condition and actually reduced and are still reducing poverty rates as a result.

And yet certain people keep on trying to find ways to beat up on poor folks, to blame poverty on individual choice and not on economic, political, and social policies.

And BTW, I said that not credoconsolans

But in this thread, nobody is beating up on poor people or blaming their poverty on their choices.

They are saying the reasons that poor people are overweight, and more overweight than they have been historically, are essentially the same as the reasons that rich people are overweight and more overweight than they have been historically. There is not one set of reasons, due to their poverty, that make poor people overweight, and a completely different set of reasons which make non-poor people overweight.

Many of us have our own weight-gain/weight-loss stories. I used to be overweight, but I'm not now. I walk past the same shops as I always did, and the same shops as tens of thousands of other people also do. Some of them are better off than I, some of them are worse; some of them are fatter than I have ever been, and some are thinner than I'll ever be. To say that obesity is a problem of poverty seems to be ignoring the facts.

 

[NobleSavage]

You want the data?

People have blamed the problems of poverty on poor people since poverty began and the only thing that has accomplished is the continuation of poverty. In modern time, societies started treating poverty as a social condition and actually reduced and are still reducing poverty rates as a result.

And yet certain people keep on trying to find ways to beat up on poor folks, to blame poverty on individual choice and not on economic, political, and social policies.

And BTW, I said that not credoconsolans

But in this thread, nobody is beating up on poor people or blaming their poverty on their choices.

They are saying the reasons that poor people are overweight, and more overweight than they have been historically, are essentially the same as the reasons that rich people are overweight and more overweight than they have been historically. There is not one set of reasons, due to their poverty, that make poor people overweight, and a completely different set of reasons which make non-poor people overweight.

Many of us have our own weight-gain/weight-loss stories. I used to be overweight, but I'm not now. I walk past the same shops as I always did, and the same shops as tens of thousands of other people also do. Some of them are better off than I, some of them are worse; some of them are fatter than I have ever been, and some are thinner than I'll ever be. To say that obesity is a problem of poverty seems to be ignoring the facts.

I agree with everything you said, except that obesity seems to hit the poor worse. With all the variables at play I'm very hesitant to link any of them causality. It would make just as much sense to say that obesity leads to poverty. It's harder to get a job when you are fat. Fat people are discriminated against in just about every way. Being fat can mess up your psyche. It's hard to to tie your shoes when you are fat. Getting in shape and losing weight might be a good method to get out of poverty. If anything it's probably a death spiral like depression and alcohol.

I'd love to do a controlled experiment. Give everyone in group 1) a free Star Trek food replicator...

 

[AthenaAwakened]

You want the data?

People have blamed the problems of poverty on poor people since poverty began and the only thing that has accomplished is the continuation of poverty. In modern time, societies started treating poverty as a social condition and actually reduced and are still reducing poverty rates as a result.

And yet certain people keep on trying to find ways to beat up on poor folks, to blame poverty on individual choice and not on economic, political, and social policies.

And BTW, I said that not credoconsolans

But in this thread, nobody is beating up on poor people or blaming their poverty on their choices.

They are saying the reasons that poor people are overweight, and more overweight than they have been historically, are essentially the same as the reasons that rich people are overweight and more overweight than they have been historically. There is not one set of reasons, due to their poverty, that make poor people overweight, and a completely different set of reasons which make non-poor people overweight.

Many of us have our own weight-gain/weight-loss stories. I used to be overweight, but I'm not now. I walk past the same shops as I always did, and the same shops as tens of thousands of other people also do. Some of them are better off than I, some of them are worse; some of them are fatter than I have ever been, and some are thinner than I'll ever be. To say that obesity is a problem of poverty seems to be ignoring the facts.

The facts for YOU in YOUR life.

The thread isn't just about obesity, but about the price of eating healthy and whether or not healthy foods are priced out of reach of poor people. In many cases, i say yes. Of course I look at the totality of cost whereas others look at the sales price in the circular.

 

[Perspicuo]

Looks like we have our answer.

Beans and rice are mighty nice.

Beans give me horrible gastrointestinal problems, espcially when at a stressy time. I don't think this is exceptional. But yeah, beans and rice would be nice...