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Sentences of wisdom
The reason the least healthful calories in the supermarket are the cheapest is that those are the ones the farm bill encourages farmers to grow.
That is Michael Pollan, here is much more.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on April 26, 2007 at 04:31 PM in Food and Drink | Permalink
Comments
Sounds like a good project for an aspiring experimental economist. If fresh fruits and vegetables were priced equally with junk food, would lower income families continue to consume more junk food than families at higher income levels? My guess is yes. Why are lower income people more likely to smoke even though it is an expensive habit?
Posted by: subrosa at Apr 26, 2007 4:59:12 PM
We attempt to empirically address a question similar to this
one in our paper "Cheap Donuts and Expensive Broccoli: The
Effect of Relative Prices on Obesity" available at
http://ssrn.com/abstract=976484 (joint with Jonah Gelbach and
Thomas Stratmann)
Posted by: Jon at Apr 26, 2007 5:32:15 PM
I heard Pollan on Bloomberg last night, though, and he mixed in some pretty dumb sentences along with the wise ones. For instance, he imagines that farmers are especially loath to cut production at times of market disequilibrium as compared to, say, manufacturers. I nearly started shouting "Big Three!" and "you can't get back opportunity costs!" at the radio.
Also, he was tossing around a lot of "The free market in food has failed" tripe which somewhat contradicts the article.
Posted by: Bernard Guerrero at Apr 26, 2007 5:43:27 PM
What subrosa said.
People like sugar and fat. That's why they eat them. Not because they can't afford enough calories other than by buying corn syrup.
And really, his methodology ("Drewnowski gave himself a hypothetical dollar to spend, using it to purchase as many calories as he possibly could.") is... I don't even have words for it that aren't simply "complete bullshit".
People do not shop for caloric maximization (unless perhaps they're literally starving and so low on funds they'll actually, fatally starve if they don't - certainly not the case for the American Poor).
(Next he'll be shocked that no amount of money will increase the amount of calories he gets from healthy water above zero!
His thesis would be compelling if he could show that a significant number of poor people can't afford to eat healthy diets. All he's really shown is that they can stuff themselves with fat and sugar.)
Posted by: Sigivald at Apr 26, 2007 5:53:38 PM
Sigivald--
You seem to suggest that if a person can afford something that they desire they will automatically purchase it. But this is simply not true--it goes back to the whole problem of unlimited wants and limited resources. My own (food) example:
Strictly speaking, I can afford to increase the intake of fish in my diet (and as both a lover of fish and as someone very aware that fish is among the most healthful foods we can consume, I would do just that in an ideal world). But fish is more expensive than my fish-substitutes: beef, chicken, pork. Consequently, either my savings would go down or I would have to reduce my spending somewhere else. But I don't want to change my spending/saving habits--I would like to think that given my current budget I am maximizing my utility exactly as things stand.
Even if a poor family can both afford and desires healthier food, that does not mean they automatically purchase that healthier food. For that family, the discretionary income that could be used for healthier food might bring greater utility if spent any number of areas: transportation, savings, housing, clothing, or any of the infinite goods available for purchase in the American marketplace.
The point the author was making was the the choice between paying for healthy food or paying for [good x] is distorted by America's amazingly screwy farm policy.
Posted by: vm at Apr 26, 2007 7:28:11 PM
"The reason the least healthful calories in the supermarket are the cheapest is that those are the ones the farm bill encourages farmers to grow."
Well, what makes food unhealthy? Unhealthy is essentially *defined as* empty calories. That's what people mean when they say unhealthy. Lots of calories, not much else. So if his conclusion is that sugary and fatty foods have the most calories per dollar, well, that's because sugars and fats are where calories come from. To get an equal number of calories from healthy food means you're buying just as much carbohydrates & fats, but you're buying some other nutrients too. This point is nearly tautological.
Candy and soda are *efficient* sources of calories and that's why we consider them unhealthy. This won't change, no matter what our farm policy.
Posted by: Alex F at Apr 26, 2007 8:33:02 PM
I respect Michael Pollen and his food sensibilities. But he knows little about farm policy, is no economist, and is clueless about the food purchase decisions of the poor.
Until 1995, US farm policy was as much designed to control supply as it was to subsidize farm income. Farmers were paid to idle as much land as Washington deemed necessary to balance supply. The 1995 legislation changed this, and also de-coupled payments from production, meaning that a corn farmer could raise asparagus and still receive his corn subsidy. Today there are still some payments that are tied to production, but for a large part, Pollen is precisely backward in his thesis on farm programs. Also, it is highly unlikely that ending farm programs would raise world commodity prices. If subsidies end, the cost of inputs, especially land, would fall and production would continue at a lower cost(price).
Industrial agriculture in the US has been a boon to the environment, reducing the overall environmental footprint of food production. E.g., since 1960 we have doubled the production of milk while halving the number of dairy cows.
Clearly one of the reasons people are fat is because food is so incredibly cheap. But you can be healthy and cheap if you are savvy. Bulk rice and beans are still the cheapest thing going. Unfortunately, they just don't satisfy like a coke and a twinkie (or the $ menu at Mickie D's.)
Posted by: Brian at Apr 26, 2007 9:03:55 PM
If Pollan analyzed the real inputs to food prices he would discover that the foods he deems "healthy" cost more generally because they are much less convenient (for the supply chain, and often for consumers) than "unhealthy" (per Pollan) foods, or else they are effectively (to the consumers Pollan thinks about) "luxury goods" for which there is insufficient demand to stimulate a large supply which might drive down prices.
I wish particularly to point out that Pollan does not shop where people who demand "healthy foods" shop. Right here in my own backyard there are factor-of-4 differences between the prices of veggies and fish in the "American" supermarket (e.g., Albertsons) and in the "Asian" supermarket (e.g., 99-Ranch). The immigrants who shop in 99-Ranch (and natives like myself, who are married to them) demand a lot of veggies and fish and get it at low prices. The demand for veggies and fish in the "American" supermarkets is lower and less elastic, the supply is less, and the prices are higher.
Prof. Cowen, I can hardly believe you would fall for Pollan's foolishness.
("American" demand for fish and veggies is less elastic, curiously, because Americans consume more packaged food. Both fresh fish and vegetables require cooking; that is, they must be complemented with a labor input before consumption. Americans don't want to perform that labor and can only afford to have others perform it by purchasing prepared, packaged foods which Pollan considers unhealthy. So when Americans do seek fresh fish or vegetables, they are usually shopping for a "special occasion," a meal to which they have specially decided to devote a lot of labor (say, for dinner party). They require groceries for this meal, but the other costs of preparing it will dwarf even an unfavorable price for veggies. The cost of searching out cheaper vegetables for a rare purchase would certainly exceed the price premium the American supermarket will demand. Since many Americans shop for vegetables and fish only when the price-elasticity of their demand is at a minimum (the veggies being effectively bundled with more desirable goods), they end up paying high prices.
Pollan's analysis (second-hand as it is) also falls down when you realize that by computing dollars-per-calorie he's neglecting the very important calorie-to-weight (or calorie-to-bulk) ratio of the foods which interest him, along with other important considerations.
Snickers bars are more calorific than broccoli and cheaper on a per-calorie basis, but their calorie density (Snickers: 475 KCal/100g, info from USDA) is fifteen times higher (raw broccoli: 34 KCals/100g, also from USDA) and unlike broccoli, candy bars last for months without refrigeration! The cost of distributing calories in the form of Snickers bars is so much lower that it would be surprising if those calories did not cost less.
NOTE: The US Department of Agriculture provides a lot of useful information about various foods through this link: http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/
Posted by: Mark Seecof at Apr 26, 2007 9:40:19 PM
Mollan wrote: "Enlightened eaters also recognize their dependence on farmers, which is why they would support a bill that guarantees the people who raise our food not subsidies but fair prices. Why? Because they prefer to live in a country that can still produce its own food and doesn’t hurt the world’s farmers by dumping its surplus crops on their markets."
Not subsidies but fair prices? Are price supports not considered subsidies?
I don't think he even mentioned the high price of sugar (due to protection) and the low price of corn (due to subsidization ... excuse me, "fair prices") which result in increased consumption of corn syrup versus much healthier sugar cane.
This article could have been much better.
Posted by: Jake at Apr 26, 2007 10:29:40 PM
Alex F:
Pollan pointed out there a lot more processing goes into a Twinkie than into a carrot. A Twinkie may have less nutrients than an amount of carrots with its equivalent of calories, but prima facie it seems that the production of Twinkies involves a lot more addition of ingredients (mostly non-nutritious) and processing of raw ingredients. So just because carrots have nutrients in addition to calories, whereas Twinkies don't, doesn't mean it's more expensive to supply them.
Posted by: Ponder Stibbons at Apr 26, 2007 11:41:38 PM
How is that sentence wise? How is it any less a tautology than the sentence "The reason red shoes are the cheapest is that those are the ones being subsidized"? The sentence seems to imply something profound about the health qualities of food and government policies, but it really doesn't say anything at all.
It certainly doesn't establish that the foods being subsidized really are unhealthy. It doesn't even suggest, let alone demonstrate, that there's some reason the supposedly unhealthy foods are the ones that have been chosen for subsidies.
Posted by: eddie at Apr 26, 2007 11:59:20 PM
Let me say "ditto" to most of the comments above, especially Mark Seecof's. Including Mark's multiply implied point, namely that Pollan's belief that some foods are particularly healthier than others (a belief the general public seems to share) is horsehockey. About the best we know right now is that a diet high in fruits and vegetables is correlated with a reduction in cancer incidence (but not mortality), that a diet high in fiber and low in fat is correlated with lower cholesterol (but not heart disease or mortality), and that a calorie is a calorie is a calorie whether it comes from Twinkies or granola. Everything else is speculation based on conflicting studies and inadequate data.
Posted by: eddie at Apr 27, 2007 12:13:03 AM
Mark Seecof, it's possible to have healthy food (especially the veggies) without doing the prep work or paying restaurant prices by getting it at a salad bar.
I suspect that part of the perceived cost of healthy food isn't the money--it's that it takes longer to feed yourself if you're eating high fiber food. This makes a difference for people with extremely tight schedules, and it might make a difference to people who are used to getting their calories at a high rate.
Posted by: Nancy Lebovitz at Apr 27, 2007 12:57:01 AM
Ponder S: Some quick Googling reveals that a Twinkie has 150 calories, which is about 3 cups worth of carrots. In other words, 42.5 grams of Twinkie have the same calories as about 380 grams of Twinkie -- Twinkies are 9 times as calorie dense as carrots. Breaking it down, carrots have essentially 0 fat and are a little under 10% carbohydrates. A Twinkie is over 60% carbohydrates and is over 10% fat.
So: why does a Twinkie cost less per calorie than a carrot? Because carrots are naturally very poor sources of calories, while all the processing that goes into making Twinkies makes them (a) efficient sources of calories, and (b) easier to store and preserve. It's no surprise that processing something by adding fats and sugars to it won't increase its cost per calorie, and all those preservatives ultimately make it *cheaper* because they reduce transportation and storage costs. Carrots, on the other hand, need to be refrigerated. (I'm essentially repeating Mark Seecof's Snicker/Broccoli points here.)
Take away all the farm subsidies in the world, triple the price of sweeteners, candy and soda will still be super-efficient sources of calories.
And, as Brian points out, there are cheap unprocessed foods with lots of calories -- eg, beans and rice. Carrots just happen to not be one of them.
Posted by: Alex F at Apr 27, 2007 3:41:56 AM
So: why does a Twinkie cost less per calorie than a carrot? Because carrots are naturally very poor sources of calories
Yes -- what a lame, dishonest move to compare twinkies and carrots.
With or without subsidies (which, yes are a scourge), calories from grain are going to be the cheapest (and much cheaper, BTW, in 50lb bags of flour than in twinkies).
If you want a more reasonable comparison (which Pollan obviously does not) compare the cost of a 150 calorie twinkie with a 150 calorie banana. In most supermarkets the banana is probably as cheap or cheaper than the twinkie.
Posted by: Slocum at Apr 27, 2007 7:25:52 AM
Not only is it dishonest, it's a tautology. Fats have 9 kCal per gram, alcohol 7 kCal, carbs and proteins, 4 kCal per gram. Foods that are high in fat will always be the most efficient stores of calories, in fact, that's the reason the human body converts carbohydrates to fats, they're efficient stores of metabolic energy.
Posted by: Aschkan at Apr 27, 2007 10:10:46 AM
The most precious thing in a supermarket is shelf (or floor) space (can you say "slotting fees?"). The second most precious thing is labor. Wholesale cost of goods comes in way behind. Fresh vegetables are mostly water. They perish easily. They harbor and attract insects. They are very heavy and bulky and require a lot of labor to stock, rotate, sell (must be weighed), and carry out but contain few calories. Of course their price-per-calorie is high.
Posted by: Mark Seecof at Apr 27, 2007 1:00:23 PM
I can't believe you all disagree with Michael Pollan. I was looking at calorie contents of some common foods, and I can guarantee we would be a much thinner society if we had to rely on saffron and bald eagle eggs. We should get rid of subsidies on rice and corn.
Posted by: Brant at Apr 27, 2007 2:56:51 PM
Pollan is right that the farm bill has disasterous unplanned consequences, but he cannot see clear of his a priori assumption that the fair market is worse. Thus:
"This perverse state of affairs is not, as you might think, the inevitable result of the free market."
Amazing. Who is the "you" who would think that?
At the end of the article appears the passage that Jake extracted above. It's the looking-glass version of Juliet on the balcony:
What's in a name? that which we call a subsidy
By some other name would smell just fine;
In arguing for a fairer, better "food bill" Pollan happily ignores history: the fact that the current farm bill is founded on arguments just as noble and fair-minded as his own.
Posted by: Henry at Apr 27, 2007 3:30:39 PM
Free market. Damn half-spoonerism.
Posted by: Henry at Apr 27, 2007 3:39:18 PM
