Waist Sizes Growing As The Economy Shrinks?

Not only are many people choosing lower cost foods that may not have as much nutritional value, but they are also making other decisions that may negatively impact their health.

Although I have not seen many people cancelling their health club memberships in my area, the number of people coming in for tours of the club and then joining are fewer than in years past.

Now, we have people that are choosing foods that can cause obesity and they are leading more sedentary lifestyles.

Buy frozen produce! There is less chance for waste and they are more affordable than fresh produce. In almost all instances, they pack the same nutrient punch.

This is a toughie. On one hand, if obesity is rampant, one way to cut a food budget is to eat less. Sure, you have to get used to being a little hungrier or waiting longer between meals, but it's doable. Just ask anyone who lived through the Great Depression! On the other hand, not everyone is obese, and asking slim people to cut down food intake (especially if we're talking about families with kids) isn't exactly healthy. I personally keep my food budget down by preparing foods at home from scratch, but I also work at home. If I was working outside of the house for 40+ per week and dealing with childcare, I might feel less like making soups and breads and things.

That said, simple foods are the best when it comes to saving $!

While it's an interesting read, it's not all that useful in a practical sense because there is no quantification of the calories.

For example, the link provided highlights that 200-calories of broccoli costs $1.93...the quantity of broccoli to reach 200-calories is 10-cups - that is a lot of broccoli - just 19-cents per cup!

Celery at $3.11 per 200-calories - that's 33 medium stalks, which again, is a lot of servings, and they're likely to be consumed with something else.

Then there is the example of uncooked dry pasta for 21-cents...that translates to approximately 2-ounces dry, or one serving. But then what to add to the pasta to eat it? Sauce? That costs more. Fat/oil + herbs? That costs more. Pasta is one of those items that is deceptive in price since no one eats it just cooked on its own!

What's also interesting is the inclusion of something like the sliced smoked turkey - deli turkey, convenient, $3.19 per 200-calories - with no comparison to the price of turkey if you buy it, cook it and slice it yourself. Where I live, turkey at this time is selling for $8.99 a pound at the deli counter, but $0.89 a pound in the meat case for whole turkey breasts. I can buy a 10-pound turkey breast for the same as 1-pound deli sliced. That 10-pounds of turkey will yeild 1756-calories when cooked, so it will provide 8.78 200-calorie servings, or cost $1.02 per 200-calories...or 68% less than the deli turkey per 200-calories.

I'm not even going to get into the junk in the comparisons!

Check out this article from a couple of years ago:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/22/magazine/22wwlnlede.t.html?_r=4&pagewanted=1

Although I don't agree with it completely - I feel it is up to ourselves and up to children's parents to eat right - it's still very eye-opening regarding all of the lobbying and subsidies.

Its true. Cheaper foods are unhealthy.
For example MacDonalds and KFC:)

Meat is very expensive, and cheese isn't cheap. Nor is fruit. I'm lucky enough to have a great cheap Farmer's Market. amd I try to buy in bulk, if I can. I'm training myself to love leftovers, so I make a big pot of stuff, eat it for a bunch of meals until it's gone.

I could see this being a problem if food isn't important to you in your budget. As for me, I refuse to compromise on what I eat, even if it IS more expensive. My grandma (who lived through the Depression) tells me that when she was a little girl, families spent a lot of their household budget on their food because feeding a family well was a source of pride. Today, a lot more people spend their money on things like digital cable, iPods, cell phone bills, computers, etc. and they don't care as much about what they eat.

So I will continue to buy my not-so-calorie dense, nutritious food because I refuse to compromise there. As long as you shop smart, you can definitely get decent food without spending a lot of money. Use coupons, shop store specials, buy at a discount grocery store (Aldi's RULES!!), look for "reduced" produce if you're going to eat it within a day or two (it's sometimes a little less fresh, but it's often marked down by 50% or more). Also, look for cheaper cuts of meat that you can cook slowly to tenderize it and think about only eating meat a couple of times a year and make more vegetarian dishes. You can't tell me that a delicious, veggie-filled bean cassoulet isn't a lot more appealing than some boxed mac and cheese crap.

Wow, great blog. I agree completely with less money people might lean toward cheaper, less healthy food. I love reading the blogs on this website!

We've been having cash flow problems in our household for the last three months and are spending a fraction of what we used to on food. I concur that it's cheaper to buy foods high in sugar or fat than to but proper, fresh, healthy food.

As we are struggling so much that we are all losing weight because we are eating less food, but what we do eat is still rubbish. We may be slimmer but are probably more unhealthy than ever.

Having grown up in a family with very little money, unhealthy foods tend to be cheaper-- especially if you're short on time from working multiple jobs or whatever... and even what's given to charity tends to be unhealthy stuff for families with no other means to food...

People always talk about how you can eat healthfully on a budget when this comes up... but they refuse to look at the time it takes for people very time crunched, the education on the importance of healthful eating being reduced in low-income areas, and that it still often doesn't compensate.

My dad and little brother and one other guy live in a household without much money; they spend $150 a month on groceries--- crap food, but it feeds them.
For my husband and myself, healthy food, and I make from scratch, I spend that much a week, at least.

I notice that the volume of food versus price per 200 calories inversly corellates too. So while yes you can buy 200 calories of cheetos for less than say an apple, you have to eat twice, if not three or four times, as much cheetos to get the same filling effect that an apple would give you. To me that says the cost per calorie thing is a wash.

I've found that eating healthy doesn't necessarily mean a higher food bill. You really have to look at your eating habits and grocery bills though to see. Sure, the healthier stuff might seem like it costs more...but when you completely stop buying the junk foods you end up spending less! Our bill actually went down about $200 each month since I forced my family to start eating healthier stuff!