Are the poor fat?
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It's a little difficult to think of a car as a luxury when you live in a part of the country where the temperature are below freezing for more than half of the year, and if you work more than a couple of miles away from your home and don't have public transportation available to you you will be risking your life if you try to walk to work.
I have lived in Canada for 54 of my nearly 61 years and have never owned a car nor have I needed to. During all this time I have heard thousands of people complain how impossible it is to live without a car. I have also noticed that it is only the people who HAVE cars who cannot live without them. People who don't have cars seem to be doing just fine. And, coincidentally, areas of the country with highest car ownership also have the highest rates of obesity. Hmmmm0 -
Its certainly cheaper to buy cheaper, fattier cuts of meat. You tend to gravitate toward the cheaper loaves of bread, usually white sliced for $1 at the supermarket... not wholegrain which is $3. I live in Australia and produce is ridiculously expensive. If you have access to a local market (not a "farmers market... " your a bit better off, also I noticed around Asian centered communities the food is cheaper... but if you are relying on Woolworths or Coles for your every day and you are trying to survive of minimum wage its not easy. I paid $10 a kg for tomatoes not a week ago at Woolworths and they are in season...$5 for an avocado. Which in contrast... you can also pay $5 for a large pizza at Dominos that will probably feed two kids or an adult
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Fruits and vegetables are relatively inexpensive, but you will find you have to go to the store more often and this becomes a burden.
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My personal choices force me to the store to get fruits and vegetables at least once a week if not more. I buy meat when its on sale, sometimes I stock my freezer if its a good enough buy. Where I live we also have a meat-market, a local butcher that has meat and other odds and ends prepared and a discount prices for buying at the source.
I'd have to say personal choice is more like it. I chuck my fruit and veggies in the fridge or freezer and I ignore the ones in the fridge for weeks or months before they ever go bad. The ones in the freezer pretty much don't go bad. This does work for me because I cook most of my veggies before eating , though. To get a salad it'd usually be away from home, as fresh veggies sitting outside the fridge would typically go bad in my house for sure.0 -
Now if everybody would be this productive, nobody would accuse the poor of being lazy or fat:)Ill weigh in. We live below the national poverty level. I can buy a economy pack (100) honeybuns for the same price as three d'anjou pears. I can buy 25 tacos for the price of one uncooked, unseasoned pork tenderloin.
However- i live in a rural area. We saved and scrounged and went hungry to make an investment. We bought chickens and heirloom seeds. Now, i get 38 eggs a day (at $0.02/per egg) and up to 400lbs of produce a season (ex. Zuchinni ends up being under $0.01). It was a $300 investment and takes about 10 hours out of my day. We plan on hatching eggs to raise meat birds (they'll end up about $0.03/lb) and are going to invest in milk goats or a dairy cow.
$300 wouldnt have bought my family a months worth of healthy food in a store.
Eta- we ended up saving enough for the gun im holding in my pic-a hunting rifle. Another investment to bag meat for the cost of a bullet
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I think everyone has their own individual reasons for why they are overweight and for a few people it may be reasons because they are poor (they live in an area where they don't have access to good quality foods or fresh foods are expensive) but for most people it's about the choices they make as to what food they put in their mouths.
We live around the poverty line and we are all thin. We eat fresh fruits and vegetables, shop at the farmer's market, and include many organic foods in our diets. We have family members with more money than us who are overweight, and family members with less money than us who are overweight.
We make the decision to eat healthy and be active, the others don't. We may spend less on food and buy less food but the quality of our food is better. We don't eat for the sake of eating, we eat for nutritional value, we don't overeat. The same can't be said for our family members.0 -
Folks in more urban areas often do not have the option of being 'this productive;' most apartment-dwellers in the USA, for example, don't have the choice to own livestock or grow crops, while Child and Family Services may (not 'will' but 'may') be notified if a teacher learns that a family has made a decision to 'go hungry to make an investment.'
Now if everybody would be this productive, nobody would accuse the poor of being lazy or fat:)Ill weigh in. We live below the national poverty level. I can buy a economy pack (100) honeybuns for the same price as three d'anjou pears. I can buy 25 tacos for the price of one uncooked, unseasoned pork tenderloin.
However- i live in a rural area. We saved and scrounged and went hungry to make an investment. We bought chickens and heirloom seeds. Now, i get 38 eggs a day (at $0.02/per egg) and up to 400lbs of produce a season (ex. Zuchinni ends up being under $0.01). It was a $300 investment and takes about 10 hours out of my day. We plan on hatching eggs to raise meat birds (they'll end up about $0.03/lb) and are going to invest in milk goats or a dairy cow.
$300 wouldnt have bought my family a months worth of healthy food in a store.
Eta- we ended up saving enough for the gun im holding in my pic-a hunting rifle. Another investment to bag meat for the cost of a bullet0 -
People get fat cause they overeat. Being poor isn't an excuse to eat a lot of food.
I agree!!!0 -
It's a little difficult to think of a car as a luxury when you live in a part of the country where the temperature are below freezing for more than half of the year, and if you work more than a couple of miles away from your home and don't have public transportation available to you you will be risking your life if you try to walk to work.
I have lived in Canada for 54 of my nearly 61 years and have never owned a car nor have I needed to. During all this time I have heard thousands of people complain how impossible it is to live without a car. I have also noticed that it is only the people who HAVE cars who cannot live without them. People who don't have cars seem to be doing just fine. And, coincidentally, areas of the country with highest car ownership also have the highest rates of obesity. Hmmmm
You clearly live in an area with public transportation.
Cars do not make people obese. I'm not about to walk the 16 mile drive to work, a journey that would take 40 minutes in a car. My time is more valuable than wasting most of my day walking to my destination. If I had access to public transportation, then that would be a different story.0 -
Without the car we wouldn't have drive thru's and with out drive thru's people would be as fat. so I'm going with cars add to obesity, plus glove boxes hold a lot of food.
It's a little difficult to think of a car as a luxury when you live in a part of the country where the temperature are below freezing for more than half of the year, and if you work more than a couple of miles away from your home and don't have public transportation available to you you will be risking your life if you try to walk to work.
I have lived in Canada for 54 of my nearly 61 years and have never owned a car nor have I needed to. During all this time I have heard thousands of people complain how impossible it is to live without a car. I have also noticed that it is only the people who HAVE cars who cannot live without them. People who don't have cars seem to be doing just fine. And, coincidentally, areas of the country with highest car ownership also have the highest rates of obesity. Hmmmm
You clearly live in an area with public transportation.
Cars do not make people obese. I'm not about to walk the 16 mile drive to work, a journey that would take 40 minutes in a car. My time is more valuable than wasting most of my day walking to my destination. If I had access to public transportation, then that would be a different story.0 -
Without the car we wouldn't have drive thru's and with out drive thru's people would be as fat. so I'm going with cars add to obesity, plus glove boxes hold a lot of food.
It's a little difficult to think of a car as a luxury when you live in a part of the country where the temperature are below freezing for more than half of the year, and if you work more than a couple of miles away from your home and don't have public transportation available to you you will be risking your life if you try to walk to work.
I have lived in Canada for 54 of my nearly 61 years and have never owned a car nor have I needed to. During all this time I have heard thousands of people complain how impossible it is to live without a car. I have also noticed that it is only the people who HAVE cars who cannot live without them. People who don't have cars seem to be doing just fine. And, coincidentally, areas of the country with highest car ownership also have the highest rates of obesity. Hmmmm
You clearly live in an area with public transportation.
Cars do not make people obese. I'm not about to walk the 16 mile drive to work, a journey that would take 40 minutes in a car. My time is more valuable than wasting most of my day walking to my destination. If I had access to public transportation, then that would be a different story.
Cars have steering wheels that turn the opposite way of the drive thru. And drivers with brains who can make choices not to go into the drive through. Cars are tools, like spoons. If cars are part of the obesity problem, then perhaps spoons are too.0 -
I'm poor and I manage to eat healthy, that's bull****!0
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It's a little difficult to think of a car as a luxury when you live in a part of the country where the temperature are below freezing for more than half of the year, and if you work more than a couple of miles away from your home and don't have public transportation available to you you will be risking your life if you try to walk to work.
I have lived in Canada for 54 of my nearly 61 years and have never owned a car nor have I needed to. During all this time I have heard thousands of people complain how impossible it is to live without a car. I have also noticed that it is only the people who HAVE cars who cannot live without them. People who don't have cars seem to be doing just fine. And, coincidentally, areas of the country with highest car ownership also have the highest rates of obesity. Hmmmm
Well obviously it's the people that HAVE cars that can't live without them. The people that DON'T have cars obviously DO live without them. Yeah I think you're right. Having a car makes you fat.....what ridiculous logic.
Having a car means that I can have a job and pay my bills. End of.0 -
I'm a UK student and my housemates all budget together to get their weekly shopping to save money, but it's always junk food, and cheap food. In order to eat healthy I've had to separate myself from this and it costs me a fortune. I constantly struggle with student funding to make ends meet (and I also work part time). I've tried to persuade better eating, but I think they would rather spend less money each week.0
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There are large areas in the US where public transportation is not available and many of them are rural, so your neighbor may be 10 miles up the road and there might not even be another house in between, much less a place of employment.
It's a little difficult to think of a car as a luxury when you live in a part of the country where the temperature are below freezing for more than half of the year, and if you work more than a couple of miles away from your home and don't have public transportation available to you you will be risking your life if you try to walk to work.
I have lived in Canada for 54 of my nearly 61 years and have never owned a car nor have I needed to. During all this time I have heard thousands of people complain how impossible it is to live without a car. I have also noticed that it is only the people who HAVE cars who cannot live without them. People who don't have cars seem to be doing just fine. And, coincidentally, areas of the country with highest car ownership also have the highest rates of obesity. Hmmmm
Well obviously it's the people that HAVE cars that can't live without them. The people that DON'T have cars obviously DO live without them. Yeah I think you're right. Having a car makes you fat.....what ridiculous logic.
Having a car means that I can have a job and pay my bills. End of.
I lived in a small town in GA that really didn't have a major employer -- most residents either owned their own businesses in town, were retired, independently wealthy or worked in one of the nearby towns, which were at least 45 minutes drives away on I-95. There were no buses. There were no subways or the equivalent. You walked, paid an arm and a leg to a questionable cab company or you had to own a vehicle.
It's very easy to live in a place with good public transportation or things like grocery stores within walking distance and not own a car. Try doing that somewhere where it takes half a day just to walk to your neighbor's house.
Even here, where we have a bus system, it isn't so easy. My fiance works at the airport, which is about 15 miles from our house and buses don't go there or anywhere near it. I could take a bus or walk to my job, easy. He can't. At least one of us has to have a vehicle so he can get to work.
I grew up in an area that was similar -- there was publc transportation, but it didn't go everywhere. We lived in the country, surrounded mostly by farms. The nearest grocery store was 10-15 miles away. We didn't have sidewalks and we got a lot of snow and ice on a huge hill. A small snow storm could shut the town down for a week because plows couldn't get up the hills.
That said, I will admit that getting my driver's license probably wasn't the best thing for my waistline.0 -
Spoons definitely, but use a tsp they're smaller and you'll gain weight slower. Oh, and don't leave spoons in the glove box, it's just temptation.
Without the car we wouldn't have drive thru's and with out drive thru's people would be as fat. so I'm going with cars add to obesity, plus glove boxes hold a lot of food.
It's a little difficult to think of a car as a luxury when you live in a part of the country where the temperature are below freezing for more than half of the year, and if you work more than a couple of miles away from your home and don't have public transportation available to you you will be risking your life if you try to walk to work.
I have lived in Canada for 54 of my nearly 61 years and have never owned a car nor have I needed to. During all this time I have heard thousands of people complain how impossible it is to live without a car. I have also noticed that it is only the people who HAVE cars who cannot live without them. People who don't have cars seem to be doing just fine. And, coincidentally, areas of the country with highest car ownership also have the highest rates of obesity. Hmmmm
You clearly live in an area with public transportation.
Cars do not make people obese. I'm not about to walk the 16 mile drive to work, a journey that would take 40 minutes in a car. My time is more valuable than wasting most of my day walking to my destination. If I had access to public transportation, then that would be a different story.
Cars have steering wheels that turn the opposite way of the drive thru. And drivers with brains who can make choices not to go into the drive through. Cars are tools, like spoons. If cars are part of the obesity problem, then perhaps spoons are too.0 -
Without the car we wouldn't have drive thru's and with out drive thru's people would be as fat. so I'm going with cars add to obesity, plus glove boxes hold a lot of food.
Because you can't walk into the fast food restaurant and order?0 -
There are large areas in the US where public transportation is not available and many of them are rural, so your neighbor may be 10 miles up the road and there might not even be another house in between, much less a place of employment.
It's a little difficult to think of a car as a luxury when you live in a part of the country where the temperature are below freezing for more than half of the year, and if you work more than a couple of miles away from your home and don't have public transportation available to you you will be risking your life if you try to walk to work.
I have lived in Canada for 54 of my nearly 61 years and have never owned a car nor have I needed to. During all this time I have heard thousands of people complain how impossible it is to live without a car. I have also noticed that it is only the people who HAVE cars who cannot live without them. People who don't have cars seem to be doing just fine. And, coincidentally, areas of the country with highest car ownership also have the highest rates of obesity. Hmmmm
Well obviously it's the people that HAVE cars that can't live without them. The people that DON'T have cars obviously DO live without them. Yeah I think you're right. Having a car makes you fat.....what ridiculous logic.
Having a car means that I can have a job and pay my bills. End of.
I lived in a small town in GA that really didn't have a major employer -- most residents either owned their own businesses in town, were retired, independently wealthy or worked in one of the nearby towns, which were at least 45 minutes drives away on I-95. There were no buses. There were no subways or the equivalent. You walked, paid an arm and a leg to a questionable cab company or you had to own a vehicle.
It's very easy to live in a place with good public transportation or things like grocery stores within walking distance and not own a car. Try doing that somewhere where it takes half a day just to walk to your neighbor's house.
Even here, where we have a bus system, it isn't so easy. My fiance works at the airport, which is about 15 miles from our house and buses don't go there or anywhere near it. I could take a bus or walk to my job, easy. He can't. At least one of us has to have a vehicle so he can get to work.
I grew up in an area that was similar -- there was publc transportation, but it didn't go everywhere. We lived in the country, surrounded mostly by farms. The nearest grocery store was 10-15 miles away. We didn't have sidewalks and we got a lot of snow and ice on a huge hill. A small snow storm could shut the town down for a week because plows couldn't get up the hills.
That said, I will admit that getting my driver's license probably wasn't the best thing for my waistline.
I will say that when I was a kid and lived on a farm, we all worked hard when we were home after school and fitness wasn't something that had to be taught to us. When we weren't working hard milking, feeding, haying or cleaning, we were running around playing. We had to be found after dark to come in and clean up to eat and go to bed. I don't think we were ever in the house except to eat.
When I got older and we lived in town, there was never a question of getting a ride to school, even in winter, even though we lived a couple of miles away. I walked to and from . I really was one of those parents who could tell my kids I walked to school in the blizzards through the mountains of snow......0 -
There are large areas in the US where public transportation is not available and many of them are rural, so your neighbor may be 10 miles up the road and there might not even be another house in between, much less a place of employment.
It's a little difficult to think of a car as a luxury when you live in a part of the country where the temperature are below freezing for more than half of the year, and if you work more than a couple of miles away from your home and don't have public transportation available to you you will be risking your life if you try to walk to work.
I have lived in Canada for 54 of my nearly 61 years and have never owned a car nor have I needed to. During all this time I have heard thousands of people complain how impossible it is to live without a car. I have also noticed that it is only the people who HAVE cars who cannot live without them. People who don't have cars seem to be doing just fine. And, coincidentally, areas of the country with highest car ownership also have the highest rates of obesity. Hmmmm
Well obviously it's the people that HAVE cars that can't live without them. The people that DON'T have cars obviously DO live without them. Yeah I think you're right. Having a car makes you fat.....what ridiculous logic.
Having a car means that I can have a job and pay my bills. End of.
I lived in a small town in GA that really didn't have a major employer -- most residents either owned their own businesses in town, were retired, independently wealthy or worked in one of the nearby towns, which were at least 45 minutes drives away on I-95. There were no buses. There were no subways or the equivalent. You walked, paid an arm and a leg to a questionable cab company or you had to own a vehicle.
It's very easy to live in a place with good public transportation or things like grocery stores within walking distance and not own a car. Try doing that somewhere where it takes half a day just to walk to your neighbor's house.
Even here, where we have a bus system, it isn't so easy. My fiance works at the airport, which is about 15 miles from our house and buses don't go there or anywhere near it. I could take a bus or walk to my job, easy. He can't. At least one of us has to have a vehicle so he can get to work.
I grew up in an area that was similar -- there was publc transportation, but it didn't go everywhere. We lived in the country, surrounded mostly by farms. The nearest grocery store was 10-15 miles away. We didn't have sidewalks and we got a lot of snow and ice on a huge hill. A small snow storm could shut the town down for a week because plows couldn't get up the hills.
That said, I will admit that getting my driver's license probably wasn't the best thing for my waistline.
I will say that when I was a kid and lived on a farm, we all worked hard when we were home after school and fitness wasn't something that had to be taught to us. When we weren't working hard milking, feeding, haying or cleaning, we were running around playing. We had to be found after dark to come in and clean up to eat and go to bed. I don't think we were ever in the house except to eat.
When I got older and we lived in town, there was never a question of getting a ride to school, even in winter, even though we lived a couple of miles away. I walked to and from . I really was one of those parents who could tell my kids I walked to school in the blizzards through the mountains of snow......
Uphill both ways?0 -
Its certainly cheaper to buy cheaper, fattier cuts of meat. You tend to gravitate toward the cheaper loaves of bread, usually white sliced for $1 at the supermarket... not wholegrain which is $3. I live in Australia and produce is ridiculously expensive. If you have access to a local market (not a "farmers market... " your a bit better off, also I noticed around Asian centered communities the food is cheaper... but if you are relying on Woolworths or Coles for your every day and you are trying to survive of minimum wage its not easy. I paid $10 a kg for tomatoes not a week ago at Woolworths and they are in season...$5 for an avocado. Which in contrast... you can also pay $5 for a large pizza at Dominos that will probably feed two kids or an adult
Where do you live? The cheaper loaves also include wholemeal bread for $1.50 and I have never heard of such prices for avocados or tomatoes. Grapes were $1.70 a kilo and lettuces were $1.99 at my Coles this week. A big bag of carrots costs about a dollar. If you buy fruit and veg in season, it's very affordable. For your $5 pizza you could make a stew/soup of beans and veges or a meat loaf with veges or salad or spag bol. Coles even put out a free magazine on cooking on a budget and many of their ideas come in at a couple of dollars a serve.
I think people make excuses because they couldn't be bothered making the effort to cook, or perhaps don't know how to cook.0 -
I will say that when I was a kid and lived on a farm, we all worked hard when we were home after school and fitness wasn't something that had to be taught to us. When we weren't working hard milking, feeding, haying or cleaning, we were running around playing. We had to be found after dark to come in and clean up to eat and go to bed. I don't think we were ever in the house except to eat.
When I got older and we lived in town, there was never a question of getting a ride to school, even in winter, even though we lived a couple of miles away. I walked to and from . I really was one of those parents who could tell my kids I walked to school in the blizzards through the mountains of snow......
Until I was 10, we lived in town. School was probably two miles away and I always walked. Evern in kindergarten and first grade, my mom would walk me to school. After that, I walked by myself (and didn't get kidnapped -- imagine that!). And we were outside playing all the time, even in the dead of winter. When the streetlights came on, we went in. But that was it. Climbed trees, played tag and hide and seek, rode bikes, rollerskated, walked to nearby playgrounds and played ...
When we moved to the country, I had to take a bus to school and I was a bit older, but the few kids nearby and I still preferred to be outside as much as possible.
Being an adult sucks. I want to play outside all day!0
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