Well, the Yahoo headline of
"Healthy eating is privilege of the rich" is more commentary than fact, as it's not really a privilege of the rich at all, but is a headline designed to get people mad at the rich. I saw the most commonly posted headline yesterday, that of "Study shows eating healthy costs more" and didn't have the energy to read it, because I couldn't believe that a study had to be done to illuminate the blindingly obvious.
The last line of the Yahoo article, thrown in almost as an afterthought, is in reality at the root cause of the problem. Farmers are subsidized to grow certain crops, nearly all of which are grains, which can be produced in copious amounts, which can be processed into cheap foods. These same grains make up the bulk of the Food Pyramid, which, in a shocking revelation, was designed by the US Department of
Agriculture. The US Department of Heath has since the 1960's created their own Food Pyramid, which looks surprisingly like that of the Atkins Diet (lots of meats, and fresh fruits and vegetables in season, with vastly smaller amounts of grains, and zero processed foods), but administration and administration shoots it down in favor of the Department of Agriculture's version.
The current Food Pyramid was created in 1992, but the USDA guidelines go back more than 100 years. However, it wasn't until the "Basic 7" during WWII (because of rationing) that people started eating by the Guides. After the war, in 1956, a new Pyramid based on the "Basic 4" food groups was introduced, with grains playing the central role. Whole grain and enriched breads were especially recommended as good sources of iron, B vitamins and carbohydrates, as well as sources of protein and fiber. Includes cereals, breads, cornmeal, macaroni, noodles, rice and spaghetti. Farm supports and subsidies have been around since the early 1820, and there have been all manner of various Congressional Acts along the way. But the one that set the stage was the National School Lunch Act of 1946 to deal with surplus crops, then on the heels of that, and in concert with the 1956 Pyramid, was the Agricultural Trade Development and Assistance Act of 1954 (which heavily subsidized grains, corn and the like) and the Soil Conservation (Soil Bank) Act of 1956 which still in its current Conservation Reserve Program incarnation from the Food Security Act of 1985 is mostly about dairy and grain subsidies and the controlling of production.
No only does the Food Pyramid provide for cheap foods thanks to the bulk of the items on it being made from subsidized crops like corn, wheat and other grains, and dairy, it also coincides remarkably with the rise in Type II diabetes and the obesity that has ballooned since a few years following the 1956 introduction of the Basic 4 Food Pyramid. It should come as no surprise that the reason cows, and people, get fat is because they eat too many grains. And it should come as no surprise that subsidized foods like Cheerio's and Corn Flakes are gonna be cheaper than a bunch of unsubsidized carrots and Romain lettuce.
Here's the Reuters version of the findings (the headline I first saw yesterday and couldn't mustard the radish to go and read it), which mentions fighting obesity and the problems thereof.
Eating healthy food costs more money in U.S. | Reuters
