### Author:  [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/581 "2015-01-16T00:38:10Z")
> [@monstro](#):
>
> I don’t think middle class whining is any different from the whining that poor people do. Everyone’s got their hands out. It’s just that some people are much more honest about it.
Actually, I wish this had evolved into a middle class whining thread, because that is EXACTLY the sort of thing that drives me bonkers.
“I don’t understand how you can afford to go on vacation” (Really, I don’t understand how you afford that $50,000 pickup truck in your driveway - but I’ll give you a clue on my vacation - notice the lack of expensive truck in my driveway). “I can’t believe how much the FAFSA expects us to have for a family contribution.” (Really, seventeen years ago or so you had a kid, in the meantime you are telling me that you bothered to save squat and somehow the government and your kid’s first choice college are to blame?)
The number of my kid’s high school friends driving around with new cars and no college savings. Or whose parents have saved nothing for retirement. Teenage girls in designer clothes whose parents are definitely middle class while their parents moan about the fees for their daughter to play volleyball.
---
### Author:  [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/582 "2015-01-16T03:40:04Z")
> [@even\_sven](#):
>
> So, by your logic, single-earned families (who eat more home cooked meals), must be uniquely immune to the siren call of fast food and frozen food or else more educated in very basic food prep. Or, by my logic, they have less time and resources for food prep. Which is more likely?
Wow. Way to mischaracterize what I said. I never distinguished different socio-economic groups but pointed out that people are cooking less - kind of like what [these people](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3639863/) said.
> [@](#):
>
> Results
>
> The percentage of daily energy consumed from home food sources and time spent in food preparation decreased significantly for all socioeconomic groups between 1965–1966 and 2007–2008 (p ≤ 0.001), with the largest declines occurring between 1965 and 1992. In 2007–2008, foods from the home supply accounted for 65 to 72% of total daily energy, with 54 to 57% reporting cooking activities. The low income group showed the greatest decline in the proportion cooking, but consumed more daily energy from home sources and spent more time cooking than high income individuals in 2007–2008 (p ≤ 0.001).
And guess what their study showed. Greatest decline in cooking at home? Poor people although they still cook at home more than others.
---
### Author:  [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/583 "2015-01-16T06:24:21Z")
> [@Saint\_Cad](#):
>
> Wow. Way to mischaracterize what I said. I never distinguished different socio-economic groups but pointed out that people are cooking less - kind of like what [these people](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3639863/) said.
Ok, but you said that being a dual income family “shouldn’t” be an impediment to home cooking. Regardless of what “should” happen, it is. Dual income families do cook less.
So there has to be a reason for that, right?
If you think “ignorance” is they key factor in this discussion, then that would imply there is something especially ignorant in dual earner families that isn’t there in families with a stay at home parent. Otherwise, why bring up ignorance at all in the discussion?
Your argument may be emotionally appealing, but you aren’t laying out a logical argument here.
---
### Author:  [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/584 "2015-01-16T06:37:24Z")
> [@bump](#):
>
> So… economies of scale? It’s clearly cheaper over the long haul to buy non-perishable/semi-perishable things in bulk rather than in smaller quantities. Something like laundry detergent is cheaper per load when you buy it in 128 load quantities than if you buy a 28 load bottle. Same goes for toilet paper, flour, sugar, rice, beans, pasta, etc…
>
> I guess the catch is that someone may only have say… $3 for buying flour (as an example), and ends up with a 5 lb sack, when for $10, they’d have been able to buy a 25 lb sack. (actually even cheaper; $7.50 at Sam’s Club). Buying something at a higher unit cost isn’t ever a better deal, but it may be your only choice if you’re having cash flow issues. If not, then you’re just not paying attention and/or aren’t actually applying your brain power to it.
Storage is also an issue, both in terms of appropriate cabinet space and in terms of keeping up a situation where you aren’t attracting bugs.
It would take me years to get through a 25 lb sack of flour, and I promise the cockroaches will find it before I ever see the bottom of the sack.
---
### Author:  [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/585 "2015-01-16T14:00:20Z")
> [@even\_sven](#):
>
> Dual income families do cook less.
>
> Your argument may be emotionally appealing, but you aren’t laying out a logical argument here.
In that case, no one is. Everything I see is “Dual income families eat out more because \.” My cite shows that lower socio-economic people (not necessarily single-income but let’s assume a correlation in the data) do cook at home more BUT they are increasing their eating out at a faster rate than higher income people. What is your reason for that?
---
### Author:  [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/586 "2015-01-16T15:17:33Z")
Sure, I can cook after I come home from working 8-9 hours at a job involving physical labor, but _what_ I cook is also affected by my fatigue level.
Day off? Dinner might well be (non-battered) fish filets, steamed fresh vegetables, and brown rice. Or baked chicken, sauted vegetables, and brown rice.
Work day? Ramen with a handful of vegetables dumped into it whatever leftover meat hasn’t gone green and fuzzy.
Which is healthier do you think?
It’s not JUST cooking at home, it’s _what_ you’re cooking at home. Is everything at home fried? Deep fried? Out of a box?
---
### Author:  [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/587 "2015-01-16T15:37:44Z")
I’m betting a lot of families do a meal mishmash. Stop by the Krogers to pick up a rotisserie chicken from the deli and serve it up with some frozen veggies and some Stouffer’s mac-and-cheese. Voila! A “home cooked” meal. It only took ten minutes!
But it’s really just glorified take-out, though.
Growing up in a two-parent home, I remember when my parents would come home from a long day’s work and either one would absolutely throw down in the kitchen. Spaghetti and catfish. Fried porkchops and cabbage. Bacon-egg-tomato sandwiches. Chicken noodles. But the majority of meals served at the dinner table were like what I described above. Take-out combined with frozen convenience foods. This type of meal should not be counted as “home cooked”, IMHO.
---
### Author:  [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/588 "2015-01-16T16:04:26Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#):
>
> Actually, I wish this had evolved into a middle class whining thread, because that is EXACTLY the sort of thing that drives me bonkers.
It drives me bonkers too. Maybe because I hear a whole lot more of this in my day-to-day life than “poor people whining”.
I was at Whole Foods the other day. Standing at the butcher’s, waiting for him to slice me up some pork belly. A well-dressed guy strolled over with his heavy-laden cart. The butcher asked him how his business was going, and the guy launched into a rant about how taxes and insurance were killing him.
“We made over a million dollars last year, but I didn’t take anything home! They’re really putting the screws on little guys like you and me, brother, I’ll tell you what!!”
He was shopping at Whole Foods–which isn’t exactly a discount food market. He didn’t look like he’d been skipping any meals or fancy haircuts. I’m betting one of the luxury automobiles parked out front were his. But in his mind, he was no different from the hair-net wearing guy making $12/hour.
To be honest, this guy frustrates me just as much as the single mother of three complaining that she can’t afford to live on minimum wage. Both may have really good arguments for why they think they are getting “screwed”. But I can’t really feel for them the way I _should_.
---
### Author:  [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/589 "2015-01-16T16:57:19Z")
And that’s what I just can’t accept about the “lack of time” argument.
Turn on oven to 350 degrees
Put veg in steamer or oven. Can be frozen.
Salt and pepper protein and put in skillet with a little oil over med-high heat. Brown each side 5 minutes.
Put in oven for 20-30 minutes depending on doneness desired.
So if you are not having a carb, you can be from prep to plate in 30-40 min with only really 10 minutes of being tied to the stove. With a carb YMMV. May not be fancy but it is home-cooked and cheaper than takeout.
---
### Author:  [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/590 "2015-01-16T17:08:18Z")
Protein is almost always the most expensive part of the meal. If you’re living on food stamps or near to it you can’t afford to fill up on protein, and it’s hard to fill up on just vegetables. You’re going to need a carb.
Of course, there are quick carbs - minute rice, instant noodles, etc.
Don’t forget the time for post-meal clean up, too - it’s a lot quicker to toss takeout boxes in the trash than to wash pots and plates.
---
### Author:  [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/591 "2015-01-16T17:57:23Z")
> [@Saint Cad](#):
>
> May not be fancy but it is home-cooked and cheaper than takeout.
To go back to what **even sven** said pages ago…
Every single homeowner on this thread could save a lot of money by living in a 300 sq ft efficiency in the inner city. Why don’t they do this? Because this is a lifestyle that most people don’t want to have for a lot of intangible reasons.
If you turn on the TV, you don’t see commercials showing happy people gathered around the dinner table with beanie weenies and white sandwich bread. This is a cheap, home cooked meal that only takes a few minutes to prepare…but we are all taught this is a dinner for “losers” compared with the pizzas, steaks, and burgers we are constantly bombarded with. (Or Chinese take-out. Can’t watch TV or a movie without those little boxes popping up somewhere). Just like no one wants to live in a 300 sq ft efficiency, no one wants to eat beanie weenies (or whatever “may not be fancy” meal you’re describing) every day of the week. We’ll eat these things if that’s the only option that exists. But few people are completely cut-off from cheap take-out. A poor person who eats at home most days out of the week but gets take-out the rest of the time is making a perfectly rational decision if you examine the entire equation (not just the monetary variables). It’s just a decision that conflicts with your own personal values.
Buying meat in bulk requires an outlay that poor/work-class people often can’t afford. If you’re on a limited budget, $10 of porkchops is an extravagance. That’s only going to cover–what?–maybe three meals versus the dozens that the sandwich bread, peanut butter, cereal, and milk will.
I’ve started challenging myself by cooking more. I used to just pop chicken into the oven and make a pot of rice and call this “cooking”, but now I’ve been following recipes. And I’ve realized something. My more recent creations make for really tasty leftovers. I could eat this stuff every day of the week and not get tired of it. But when I was just shoving meat into the oven, I’d get tired of it very fast. I’d still eat the leftovers, but take-out would be calling my name after the second night.
Good cooking–the kind of cooking that doesn’t make you immediately think about take-out after you eat it–actually does take some time and more than a couple of ingredients.
---
### Author:  [@Bam\_Boo\_Gut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bam_Boo_Gut)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/592 "2015-01-16T18:00:10Z")
> [@Broomstick](#):
>
> Protein is almost always the most expensive part of the meal. If you’re living on food stamps or near to it you can’t afford to fill up on protein, and it’s hard to fill up on just vegetables. You’re going to need a carb.
>
> Of course, there are quick carbs - minute rice, instant noodles, etc.
>
> Don’t forget the time for post-meal clean up, too - it’s a lot quicker to toss takeout boxes in the trash than to wash pots and plates.
When you say protein I suppose you mean meats and fish, because beans and legumes are much cheaper and have much more protein.
Green lentils … soup of the gods!
Food is to sustain you through to the next point. It’s becoming something wrapped in exciting packages, as if every meal should be a fantastic tasty treat.
---
### Author:  [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)
#### Post date: [January 16, 2015, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/593 "2015-01-16T22:25:04Z")
The argument that “poor people can’t afford to eat healthily” is pure nonsense. Poultry is cheap. Rice is cheap. Beans are cheap. Potatoes are cheap.
If you made healthy food available for _free_ many poor people still wouldn’t go near it. And a lot of other people for that matter. The truth is that a person who eats crap _ **likes** _ to eat crap, regardless of their income.
---
### Author:  [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)
#### Post date: [January 17, 2015, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/594 "2015-01-17T00:25:27Z")
> [@Bam\_Boo\_Gut](#):
>
> When you say protein I suppose you mean meats and fish, because beans and legumes are much cheaper and have much more protein.
>
> Green lentils … soup of the gods!
Have to take your word for it - last time I ate lentils it caused a trip to the ER.
Which is my problem, granted, but it certainly does make eating cheap more of a trial because peanuts and half the legumes stand a good chance of killing me if I try to eat them.
Beyond that - while beans might be cheaper under some circumstances, cooking beans from dry is NOT a quick meal. It is, in fact, quite time consuming what with the soaking and necessary prolonged cooking times, and it is NOT safe to do these in a crockpot because crockpot cooking temperatures actually cause an increase in toxic [phytohaemagglutinin](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phytohaemagglutinin). Canned beans are quick, but you pay for that convenience in a higher price per pound.
But, beyond that - a pound of dried beans is around $2 in my area, a 3 pound bag of rice is about $1.80, or about $0.60 per pound. So… the protein is more expensive. Yes, both of those items are even cheaper in larger quantities, but that gets back to the twin problems of storage and having the capital to make such an investment. Yes, the beans are cheaper than cheap meats - around $4/pound for ground meat and/or sausage - but they are still the more expensive part of many a vegetarian meal.
---
### Author:  [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)
#### Post date: [January 17, 2015, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/595 "2015-01-17T00:30:00Z")
> [@Crafter\_Man](#):
>
> The argument that “poor people can’t afford to eat healthily” is pure nonsense. Poultry is cheap. Rice is cheap. Beans are cheap. Potatoes are cheap.
>
> If you made healthy food available for _free_ many poor people still wouldn’t go near it. And a lot of other people for that matter. The truth is that a person who eats crap _ **likes** _ to eat crap, regardless of their income.
But it’s only the poor people who are raked over the coals for liking the same food everyone else does.
So you have middle-class and well off people moaning that because they’re “paying” for poor people to eat they should be able to choose what they eat and complain if they don’t comply, but it’s looks hypocritical to me because those same people are making the same poor choices they castigate someone else for making.
---
### Author:  [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)
#### Post date: [January 17, 2015, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/596 "2015-01-17T00:35:19Z")
> [@Broomstick](#):
>
> But it’s only the poor people who are raked over the coals for liking the same food everyone else does.
No, the problem is that we invent B.S. excuses. “Oh, look at the poor, obese person. It’s not _ **their** _ fault they’re obese, because…” We don’t do the same for non-poor folks.
---
### Author:  [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)
#### Post date: [January 17, 2015, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/597 "2015-01-17T00:51:42Z")
There’s a difference between “these are some of the factors that lead to obesity” versus “it’s OK to be obese”. You interpret the effort of some to identify risk factors as somehow approving or “making excuses”. It’s not. It’s just a different approach.
Some people are happy to identify what they consider a fat slob and toss them in the trash heap for being a lesser human being. Me, I consider obesity a symptom and I don’t expect it to be solved without solving the underlying problem(s). It may not always be a complex puzzle, but I don’t know anyone who set out in life to be fat.
---
### Author:  [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)
#### Post date: [January 17, 2015, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/598 "2015-01-17T01:28:44Z")
> [@Broomstick](#):
>
> There’s a difference between “these are some of the factors that lead to obesity” versus “it’s OK to be obese”. You interpret the effort of some to identify risk factors as somehow approving or “making excuses”. It’s not. It’s just a different approach.
It’s not the effort to identify risk factors. It’s the negating of the element of choice ( I’m not saying it’s specifically you, but I’ve seen in this thread and elsewhere) - poor people don’t have the time or energy to cook, they can’t afford a crockpot, the stores in their neighborhood don’t sell nutritious food. Here’s the thing - some poor people, like some middle-class people prefer to use their time and energy for something other than cooking. And that’s fine. But it’s a choice for the poor just as much as it is for the wealthier. It’s hard to get fresh produce in some neighborhoods - but when the produce is available, it doesn’t sell. Somehow, higher income people who don’t have so much as a passing acquaintance with fruits or vegetables are doing so by choice- but the poor never _choose_ to have a poor diet.
And if a poor person chooses to eat fast-food rather than cooking and then wonders how the equally poor person next door can manage to save a couple of hundred dollars to take the kids to an amusement park, that doesn’t seem so different from my acquaintance who spends 25% of his gross income on lottery tickets and can’t figure out how other people can afford cars and to save for retirement. But only one of them is likely to have excuses made for them.
---
### Author:  [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)
#### Post date: [January 17, 2015, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/599 "2015-01-17T02:04:50Z")
Being poor does make some choices harder. If you live in a neighborhood with few or no fresh food options and you’re well off you can shop somewhere else, but if you’re poor and have transportation problems that might still be an option but it involves much more effort for the poor man than the rich man.
Likewise, a store like Whole Foods might attract the well-to-do from a 25 or 30 mile radius, but the corner mom-and-pop has a much more limited audience. The Whole Foods might do just fine with only 10% of the people in its catchment area ever shopping there, but for the corner store that might not be enough to justify carrying certain items.
A pressure cooker can save a lot of cooking time, but it’s always easier to buy one if you have more discretionary income.
Yes, there certainly are some poor people who more reliably make good choices. There are also some people who are utter train wrecks. This should not be news to anyone. That means you will NEVER have either a 100% solution or 100% compliance. Some of the poor are poor due to bad luck, some are poor due to dysfunction which isn’t fixable, and some are poor due to both reasons. There’s no one solution to any of these problems because there is no one cause.
---
### Author:  [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)
#### Post date: [January 19, 2015, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949/600 "2015-01-19T23:46:12Z")
> [@Crafter\_Man](#):
>
> The argument that “poor people can’t afford to eat healthily” is pure nonsense. Poultry is cheap. Rice is cheap. Beans are cheap. Potatoes are cheap.
>
> If you made healthy food available for _free_ many poor people still wouldn’t go near it. And a lot of other people for that matter. The truth is that a person who eats crap _ **likes** _ to eat crap, regardless of their income.
My point, home cooking is not as time-consuming as people make out
Your point, home cooking is not as expensive as people make out
montro’s and even sven’s point, yeah but there’s always a reason to spend money even if it disagrees with your values.
Maybe I value not being poor?
[Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949.md?page=29)
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/financial-disacuity/707949.md?page=31)