4 ms·

> less expensive to purchase by any measure Where I see people argue this, the measure usually includes time and convenience of getting to the store, ability t

> less expensive to purchase by any measure Where I see people argue this, the measure usually includes time and convenience of getting to the store, ability to store the food, etc. Have you heard the term 'food desert'?

philipkglass 10y ago
Yes, living in a food desert makes eating well and affordably very difficult. It's unrealistic to expect people to make meals out of simple ingredients if they can't access the ingredients. Likewise a lot of good strategies are pre-empted if you don't even have a refrigerator. I find the intermediate cases interesting. Food deserts and/or dire poverty (they overlap!) can narrate why large numbers of Americans eat poorly. They aren't a satisfying explanation for why many people with cars and refrigerators choose to buy frozen TV dinners instead of frozen ingredients one aisle over (or potato chips instead of potatoes, soda instead of black coffee...). I don't have a complete answer, but I'm trying to preempt an incorrect answer ("ingredients for home cooked meals cost more than processed food") by way of counterexample. This study made quite an impression on me when it came out: http://www.academia.edu/454540/Dinner_Preparation_In_the_Modern_United_States http://www.academia.edu/454540/Dinner_Preparation_In_the_Mod... Working class families that make heavy use of pre-packaged foods do not save money on meals or save meal prep time overall (though they reduced the "hands on" phase of prep). Pre-packaged foods did simplify shopping. This points to a different set of drivers for processed foods than low sticker price. Making Hot Pockets relatively more expensive and fresh leafy greens less expensive isn't going to improve eating patterns much if (e.g.) people are eschewing home cooking to reduce cognitive overhead rather than to minimize the weekly food budget.
- vitus 10y ago
  Well, processed foods might not reduce wall clock time, but because (as you mentioned) they remove the hands-on phase, it doesn't require the attention / human time. Surely if you pop a TV dinner into the microwave, you don't stare at the microwave for the next five minutes, waiting for your dinner to finish cooking? There's also a secondary explanation that not everyone has access to a stove / hot plate and pots + pans (college students are a particularly salient example of this, especially when living in dorms). You could also attribute part of the preference for easy-to-prepare foods to lack of know-how (or even just perceived difficulty of prep) -- you'd be surprised how many people don't know how to do something as simple as fry an egg.

philipkglass 10y ago

Yes, living in a food desert makes eating well and affordably very difficult. It's unrealistic to expect people to make meals out of simple ingredients if they can't access the ingredients. Likewise a lot of good strategies are pre-empted if you don't even have a refrigerator. I find the intermediate cases interesting. Food deserts and/or dire poverty (they overlap!) can narrate why large numbers of Americans eat poorly. They aren't a satisfying explanation for why many people with cars and refrigerators choose to buy frozen TV dinners instead of frozen ingredients one aisle over (or potato chips instead of potatoes, soda instead of black coffee...). I don't have a complete answer, but I'm trying to preempt an incorrect answer ("ingredients for home cooked meals cost more than processed food") by way of counterexample. This study made quite an impression on me when it came out: http://www.academia.edu/454540/Dinner_Preparation_In_the_Modern_United_States http://www.academia.edu/454540/Dinner_Preparation_In_the_Mod... Working class families that make heavy use of pre-packaged foods do not save money on meals or save meal prep time overall (though they reduced the "hands on" phase of prep). Pre-packaged foods did simplify shopping. This points to a different set of drivers for processed foods than low sticker price. Making Hot Pockets relatively more expensive and fresh leafy greens less expensive isn't going to improve eating patterns much if (e.g.) people are eschewing home cooking to reduce cognitive overhead rather than to minimize the weekly food budget.

vitus 10y ago
Well, processed foods might not reduce wall clock time, but because (as you mentioned) they remove the hands-on phase, it doesn't require the attention / human time. Surely if you pop a TV dinner into the microwave, you don't stare at the microwave for the next five minutes, waiting for your dinner to finish cooking? There's also a secondary explanation that not everyone has access to a stove / hot plate and pots + pans (college students are a particularly salient example of this, especially when living in dorms). You could also attribute part of the preference for easy-to-prepare foods to lack of know-how (or even just perceived difficulty of prep) -- you'd be surprised how many people don't know how to do something as simple as fry an egg.