I'm Hatin' It

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Posted by Grist at 11:50 AM on 22 Feb 2006

Americans, particularly those on the lower end of the income scale, are gaining weight and getting sick because unhealthy food is cheap and fresh fruits and veggies aren't. That's not the free market at work -- it's the distorting federal policies that prop up the market for corn. As part of our ongoing exploration of the connections between poverty and the environment, Tom Philpott explores how subsidies and shortsightedness are making poor people sick.

new in Main Dish: I'm Hatin' It

new in Main Dish: Forgotten by many, a Brooklyn neighborhood nourishes its own

see also, in Grist: Poverty & the Environment, a special series

For story: I'm Hatin' It
9 Comments | Post a Comment

I sympathise

I live in a predominantly middle eastern immigrant neighbourhood, and our only grocery store closed down on new years day, without even informing their employees. Apparently, the whole chain went bankrupt. Now it is a half hour bus ride (one way) for any of us to reach a supermarket in a more upscale neighbourhood. I know, for myself anyway, that I'm eating less healthy food since the closure, mostly because of the inconvenience of getting fresh fruit & veg, and putting off cooking because its an hour round trip if I've forgotten one ingredient.

by Arianna at 7:02 AM on 23 Feb 2006

Excellent Article

Very good analysis. I wish more people could see what you are showing to be true. I'm so sick of the people who blame obesity in the poor on their bad choices. As you showed, their choices are actually quite rational when health is of lesser concern (by necessity) than the bottom line. Time AND money are rarities for the working poor. They don't have enough of either to prepare healthful meals... and then their kids get used to eating doritos for lunch and the cycle continues.

by redjenny at 8:11 AM on 23 Feb 2006

Even Poor People Make Choices

Redjenny: I agree that if you were a poor person who decided to eat healthfully, your funds and geography would present more obsticles than for affluent people. But this is true of everything. Have you ever lived amoungst poor people? I have spent many years residing in poor areas, and living with people who grew up poor. In the US, "poor" usually means people who have cars and money that provide them access to many objects and services that would be no more difficult to obtain than whole grain breads and baby spinach. Poor people cannot purchase DVD players or $100 sneakers in their neighborhoods, but such objects are common in poor areas; apples evaperated-cane sodas could be just as common. Already the Frito-Lay chips popular in poor areas no longer contain hydrogenated oils. This is not because the government created a program. Rather, people like Tom Philpott have convinced a critical mass of Americans to shun hydrogenated oils. Many poor people in the US every year drastically improve their lot, via their choices and actions. They can certainly improve their dietary choices. And when they do, their corner stores will start selling better food products.

by paulhue at 9:14 AM on 23 Feb 2006
[ Parent ]

Governmnet Out of Agriculture

Tom: This is an issue that could unify leftist, corporate-hating weanies like you, and free-market a-holes like me. We both want to end all big ag subsidies, right? Removing the government from the food economy will enable consumers untainted choices. Healthful food will still cost more, for the most part, I imagine. But advocacy by people like you and the other grismillers can convince ever-more people to pay more to eat better.

Companies like Archer-Daniels only want to give Americans what they want. Sadly, Americans do not want healthful foods... for the most part. Archer-Daniels will change when people like you and me convince those around us to change. I reside in the western subburbs of Detroit. In seven years my requirement for healthful food for me and my undesearving child has gone from difficult to pretty easy, and getting better all the time.

I am confident that Archer-Daniels will figure out a way to get money from me. Frito-Lay has already finally produced products that meet our weido requirements. Of course I can't permit my child to eat at her school cafeteria (I have to pack her lunch everyday), but I have read of schools around the country going au natural.

by paulhue at 9:23 AM on 23 Feb 2006

Re: Even Poor People Make Choices

PS, Redjenny: 11 years ago I was a single parent living off of food stamps and other assistance, in a rental townhouse sourrounded by Section 8 houses and a housing project just one block a way. Many of my friends were in similar circumstances. But I found a way to feed my kid natural and fresh food. I made my own baby formula (I'm a man, lacking mamary glands, dammit) from a health food store's bulk brewer's yeast, black strap molasses, etc. And jars of baby food by Gerber's aren't all that much more cheaper than the organic kind.

"Poor" people figure out how to get cigarettes, beer, fancy hairdos, cable TV, and nice duds; they can figure out how to survive without eating Snickers bars, honey buns, and Pepsi... if they WANT to. And if they ever do make healthful eating as fashionable as, say, Benson's and Hedges or Rockafella jackets, I can guarantee you that those corner stores will cater to them.

My many experiances living with and working with poor people include attempts to GIVE "poor" people healthful food. And here I don't mean tofu with bean sprouts. I mean 100% fresh squeezed unpastuerized orange juice, or whole grain pizza with unsweetened tomato sauce made from scratch. Not a very successful enterprise, I am sad to report!

by paulhue at 9:33 AM on 23 Feb 2006
[ Parent ]

"Poor" Brooklynites eating healthy

New York Citers who want to help "poor" people could do no better than to purchase produce from this farmer's market:

http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2006/02/22/philpott/index1.html

by paulhue at 9:37 AM on 23 Feb 2006

Corn Subsidies Are Not the Only Contributors

Hi, Tom:

In addition to subsidies for corn growers, you can also look at price supports for sugar, compliments of the feds and the all-powerful sugar lobby. It was only a few decades ago that soft drink makers gravitated to HFCS because sugar was so expensive. Despite being a worthy producer of sugarcane, we in the U.S. still pay some of the highest prices for it, thanks to the price controls.

Today, if you go to Mexico, a Coca-Cola tastes different than in the U.S. because it is still made with sugar there (at least it was the last time I was there several years ago). It also tastes better. Even though the caloric content is not much different, HFCS metabolizes in the body differently than sugar, and this, too, contributes to obesity.

As a completely off-topic aside, I believe we were both contemporaries at the Daily Texan in the late 1980's. Small world. I'll send you an email separately about this.

Mark Brandon Sustainable Log - News and Views for Socially Responsible Investors http://sustainablelog.blogspot.com

by mebrandon at 8:34 AM on 03 Mar 2006

The sugar quota

Mark,
Daily Texan? I do seem to remember a college newspaper of that name. That was a long time ago. Fancy meeting you here!

Totally agreed about the sugar quota. Guess who pushed it into law? According to Richard Manning in Against the Grain, it was none other than Archer Daniels Midland, which lobbied that paragon of free-market zeal, Ronald Reagan, into signing it into law in 1981. Only recent has HFCS actually gotten cheaper than cane sugar. The two factors making cane sugar more expensive than HFCS are Brazil's prodigious use of its world-leading sugar crop to make ethanol; and the ever-slumping price of corn, pushed into the dirt by three straight bumper crops.

As for the issue of HFCS and metabolization, I left it out because an academic scientist I talked to--who's very critical of the food industry--says it might be a non-starter. In liquid form as in soft drinks, my scientist source tells me, both processed cane sugar and HFCS both break down to pure fructose--making them both metabolize weirdly, meaning that both contribute equally to obesity. He wasn't sure if the same thing was true in solid foods like breakfast cereal. I should have pursued it.

With both processed cane sugar and HDCS, though, what you're getting is pure calories stripped of any other food value. It's insane, because unprocessed cane sugar and real corn are perfectly healthful foods. Reduced to pure sweetness, though, they're health-ruining junk.

Thanks for writing in,
Tom

Victual Reality

by Tom Philpott at 3:49 PM on 03 Mar 2006

I just love this site!!!

I am new to the site and loved the article. It was refreshing to read something involving positive community change instead of the normal bad news of the day. I think if more communities started more programs of this type, the benefits would be wide spread and have a very positive impact on all in the community. I will continue to read the articles here and chime in from time to time. Thanks for the forum to air my viewpoint!

aeg

"Life is simple...live every day to the fullestt and drive a Corvette"

by aegrant at 2:44 AM on 12 Jan 2007

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