Homo Sum:
humani nil a me alienum puto

So, essentially, the worse something is for you, the cheaper it has become over the last two decades, while at the same time the things that are most good for you are becoming more and more expensive.

The trend is clearly towards a society where only the upper classes can afford a healthy diet.

You know, the idea that the underclasses and bottom end of the working class would be driven to poor diet because the worst food was the cheapest is not exactly a new idea in science fiction. Hell, it was explicitly stated in a broadcast on network television of an episode of Max Headroom. That was 1987, I think, right around the start of the period covered by the graph.

I see this in effect every week with our grocery bill–we endeavour to eat both food that is good for us, and food that we enjoy, and it’s not cheap. Apparently we’re getting a slight break on chicken–which is our staple protein–but I suspect the majority of our grocery dollars goes to fresh fruit and vegetables.

What happened to that whole model where the agribusiness super-farms were going to result in cheaper and more plentiful produce for everyone? How did we lose all the family farms and still end up paying more for fresh produce?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 6th, 2006 at 1:29 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.