Why is it cheaper to eat unhealthfully...

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  • CM9178
    CM9178 Posts: 1,265 Member
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    I completely agree with this.
    Produce is expensive - at least here in NJ. Farmer's markets are only in more rural areas.. the "farmer's markets" around here are still expensive.
    "low fat" anything is MUCH more expensive than full fat items.
    Sure a bag of rice may be cheap, but people don't live on rice.
    Fresh LEAN meats are very expensive - more expensive than the fattier ones. (and rarely on sale here).

    It is much cheaper to buy a pack of 80% lean ground beef than it is for a 93% lean ground beef.
    It is much cheaper to buy a gallon of whole milk versus a gallon of skim milk.
    It is much cheaper to buy prepackaged foods like Mac & Cheese and hamburger helper, than it is to buy a bunch of fresh fruits and veggies.

    Some of you are saing "it is cheaper to eat healthy because you have less medical bills and don't need medications, etc".
    A) I was eating unhealthy for 33 years and I didn't have any extra medical bills or take any medications. That may be a long term result, but that has nothing to do with how much we spend on FOOD on a weekly basis.

    I completely agree that I'd rather pay more to eat healthy than not, but It is very true that the healthy foods are more expensive.
    I'm tired of hearing that I should be buying in bulk, using coupons, shopping sales, etc. I do all of that, it is just a fact, that the healthier foods cost more money. Period.
  • PastryWizKid
    PastryWizKid Posts: 23 Member
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    Actually I find it. cheaper to eat healthy. When you buy things in the supermarket they are suppose to be portioned out. When you factor that in with weekly sales and coupons it's way cheaper to eat healthy. My suggestion is buy a food scale nothing fancy just something that works. Portion all your foods BY WEIGHT NOT VOLUME (measuring cups suck) I guarantee you will save money and lose weight.
  • trud72
    trud72 Posts: 1,912 Member
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    $20 of veges and chicken will go a lot further at the supermarket than at MacDonalds.


    YAY someone who thinks like me!!! :bigsmile:

    make your own you know whats in it and you eat healthy! :wink:
  • Nysie5
    Nysie5 Posts: 215 Member
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    I'm sorry but I disagree with this. It is so much less expensive to eat well and take care of ones self. Medications and medical care for weight related issues far exceed the cost of buying decent quality food that is nutritious and delicious.

    THAT
  • mikeyboy
    mikeyboy Posts: 1,057 Member
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    When I visited America I found that grocery stores overcharge by a lot. $1.50 for a single green pepper? Yeah, ok, I got a 4-pack for $1.29 at home (Canada) yesterday! :grumble:

    WOW! Where the in Canada did you get that? OMG, a 4 pack of peppers is 6.99 here in Ontario (not even organic), & if you buy them individually it's approx., 2.50 per pepper.

    I have found that overall the food in Canada is higher in price.
  • penrbrown
    penrbrown Posts: 2,685 Member
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    When I visited America I found that grocery stores overcharge by a lot. $1.50 for a single green pepper? Yeah, ok, I got a 4-pack for $1.29 at home (Canada) yesterday! :grumble:

    Try a farmer's market. You'll have to shop on pre-scheduled days, but you'll actually pay reasonable prices for good, wholesome food.

    That's not universally true. Where I live (in Northern Canada - I'm suspecting you're more southern based?), vegetables are ridiculously high priced and WAY more costly at the farmer's market. It's kind of stupid actually.

    That said, fresh bread is cheaper then the brand name, packaged stuff. $1.89 for bakery fresh bread as opposed to $3.49 for a McGavin's loaf of the same size. So stupid.

    Wherever you are, you just have to be more careful if you want to eat 'healthy'. That means paying attention to prices, shopping around and in general investing more time into your food.

    Most people don't want to do that so they think the McDonald's burger is cheaper. But is it?

    It cost me $40.00 for groceries this week. These groceries provided me with chicken soup (enough to last a week), Chili (also enough to last a week), fruit snacks (grapes, pineapple) and even cupcakes (home made from scratch). The soups are all made with fresh veggies and meat.

    Basically, I'm paying $5.75 a day for three meals and snacks. I rarely feel hungry. No junk. Can you really say you could feed yourself on McDonald's for cheaper then that?

    PS: I also have dietary restrictions. No gluten. No nuts. No dairy. And I still manage to make it work with just $40.00 a week. Time. You have to invest it if you want to save money.
  • vacherin
    vacherin Posts: 192
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    I think it depends what you buy, and where you shop. Organic meat and fish are quite expensive, but things like pulses and veggies are pretty cheap, especially if you buy them from the market and not all packaged up in plastic from the posh supermarket.

    I do think that special diets can be expensive, though. Gluten-free bread and pasta, for instance, are ruinously expensive compared to the regular versions.
  • Marll
    Marll Posts: 904 Member
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    It generally seems to be cheaper to eat poorly because of all the grain pushing by the USDA and all the government subsidies to help grain producers.

    Look at the typical cheap, but generally unhealthy items that use grains:

    Cookies
    Cakes
    Doughnuts
    Chips (mostly non potato based)
    Pretzels
    Crackers
    Muffins
    Microwave popcorn
    Snack bars (granola, nutrigrain, etc)
    Cereal

    I'd be willing to bet that your average household has a majority of these items on hand at any given time. Generally nobody disputes the unhealthy nature of most of these things, but people buy them anyway. The commonality between them all in my mind is grains, and we've become a grain-centric food culture. Buy real whole food and most of the bad effects of this type of junk go away.
  • ladynica
    ladynica Posts: 329 Member
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    I figure I can pay the price of healthy food at the cash register now, or I can pay three to four times as much at the doctors office in a few years. Choice is pretty easy for me.
  • cjc166
    cjc166 Posts: 222
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    Essentially every food that is cheap is made from corn (in some way shape or form) which is subsidized by the American government, meaning that our tax dollars fund those foods. This is exactly why.
  • tashjs21
    tashjs21 Posts: 4,584 Member
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    when people talk about how cheaply they shop in supermarkets, they should also take into account the very low quality food they are purchasing -

    Factory-farmed animals, raised in deplorable conditions, jacked up on steroids and antibiotics;
    Genetically modified vegetables, doused in pesticides;
    Fruit, also heavily sprayed and grown with toxic chemicals, that is shipped around the world using vast amounts of gas and oil;
    Milk from cows so sick (from a corn-based diet that spawns E. Coli) that the cows die from illness constantly;
    Fish raised in farms that are swimming in pollutants and chemicals designed to keep them alive just long enough to get to your table;

    etc.

    The result is foods that LOOK like food, but are depleted of much of their nutrition, carry dangerous pathogens from the illnesses that close contact, stress, untreated injuries, forced growth (why chicken thighs are so big), and horrific conditions in general cause, and, in the case of produce, are sprayed and treated with cancer-causing chemicals.

    Cheap food isn't cheap!

    alarmism at its best.

    Its not nearly as bad as you are making it out to be.
    Can you please show me some evidence that milk, chicken breast, and non-organic vegetables will cause all this harm?

    Thank you. While I am sure it is not as pristine as it was for people having their own chickens and own livestock. It is still a heck of a lot better than eating the overly processed doesn't even resemble food "fast foods" that people eat.
  • yoovie
    yoovie Posts: 17,121 Member
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    its freaking not, that's how

    this lame old as dirt excuse pisses me off

    im the poorest person I know and I eat like the royal family's nutritionist.

    you just have to be able to actually cook, too.
  • Kasya007
    Kasya007 Posts: 165 Member
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    When I visited America I found that grocery stores overcharge by a lot. $1.50 for a single green pepper? Yeah, ok, I got a 4-pack for $1.29 at home (Canada) yesterday! :grumble:

    WOW! Where the in Canada did you get that? OMG, a 4 pack of peppers is 6.99 here in Ontario (not even organic), & if you buy them individually it's approx., 2.50 per pepper.

    WHAT? Where on earth in Ontario do you live???
    I've never heard of those prices ($6.99) and I live in Ontario (Brampton).
    I actually JUST checked my flyers and a 4pack of peppers at Loblaws Superstore would be $2.98.

    I'm just 2 hours north of you in the Muskoka area. It's a 4 pack with 2 reds, 1 yellow and 1 orange and grown in Canada. I buy it every week and thought nothing of the cost until now. I also buy from a Loblaw's store, but one of their Independent Grocer stores, (which could explain the pricing)?!?
  • gdbadass
    gdbadass Posts: 60
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    However, what about the people that have $5 to feed themselves for the day? That dollar menu becomes mightly temping. Not saying its right, but its part of reality.

    This is very true. When I was incredibly poor, i used to get so hungry I went to the corner liquor store - if which there were several withing a 3 block radius, with no produce in sight - and bought candy just to shut my stomach up.

    Now that I have more money and know better, I make eating well a top priority.

    Your point about global warming/drought affecting food prices is also something that people should be paying more attention to.
  • Muddy_Yogi
    Muddy_Yogi Posts: 1,459 Member
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    Seriously? This is the excuse you are trying to use? You know it is totally false right? Because you can by chicken and fresh veggies and cook them and feed your family for like under 10 dollars....If I went to mc donalds and fed my family it would be about 20.....and we would all feel gross afterwards....spend more and feel like ****...no thanks! I will eat real food thank you very much!
  • rml_16
    rml_16 Posts: 16,414 Member
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    That just simply isn't true. I make a vegetarian chili that comes out to about $1.50 a serving and is extremely healthy and filling. And the veggie meat crumbles are a lot more expensive than if you used actual meat, so it could be made much cheaper. And that's just one example.

    That's cheaper than McDonald's.
  • yoovie
    yoovie Posts: 17,121 Member
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    All I hear is wah wah wah if I can t buy completely perfectly healthy food for cheaper than regular, mostly-healthy food, then Im going to spend all that money on crap, dining out, prepackaged nonsense instead.

    Free range chicken is too expensive - who wants KFC tonight?

    tumblr_m19o9lrJk41qfuusn.gif
  • penrbrown
    penrbrown Posts: 2,685 Member
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    Yes, if you can afford $50 to buy chicken, beans and rice for multiple meals, you should do it. However, what about the people that have $5 to feed themselves for the day? That dollar menu becomes mightly temping. Not saying its right, but its part of reality.

    I AM that person. Hahah. It costs me $40.00 a week, roughly $5.00 a day to eat and I have mostly soups. Chili, chicken soup, beef stew, etc. etc. etc. Meat in all of my meals. Lots of fresh veggies. Even fruit! You just gotta know how to budget and you have to be willing to have repetitive meals sometimes. No biggee to me but others might have issues with that kind of living.

    The Happy Meal isn't an option for me because of allergies and food restrictions but I STILL make it work on a tight budget.
  • myfitnessnmhoy
    myfitnessnmhoy Posts: 2,105 Member
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    First off...im not sure that "unhealthfully" is a word...but, as the subject states: Why is it so much cheaper to eat crap than it is to buy healthy foods and prepare them yourself? You can go to McDonalds and buy a cheeseburger and fries for a lot cheaper than going to the grocery store and buying foods to make a meal. It just aggravates me...

    Because you're not comparing meals to meals.

    Ground beef (90% lean) costs under $5 a pound here. An 8-pack of hamburger rolls is $1.50. Tomatoes are $3 a pound. Romaine lettuce is about $2 a head.

    So for $15, I can buy the ingredients necessary to make 8 quarter-pounders from ingredients that are all markedly superior to what McDonald's uses. That's $1.87 a burger.

    I haven't been into a McDonald's in a long time, but I think their quarter-pounder is about $3 at most places, right?
  • _Wits_
    _Wits_ Posts: 1,286 Member
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    I don't believe this to be true at all. I spend the same amount of money a week and cook A LOT compared to when we had junk food and "cheap" food.. I gave up a few hours of tv watching a week and spend it in the kitchen making myself chili, cooking chicken, portioning and bagging veggies and fruits. Besides cooking basics, my pantry has nuts, cereal, rice, pasta, and canned goods like beans, tomatoes.. The only "junk" food I buy are those little snack bags of chips, which are 4 for $1 for my husband to have when he has a sandwich or if I'm just craving them.


    Planning and preparing is what people need to learn. Five dollars a day...so what...35 bucks a week...to feed one person...that makes a crockpot of chili, a pound of chicken, steak stirfry and on and on...

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