Partnership for a Healthier America Summit 2013

The Partnership for a Healthier America Summit is this week, March 6-8, in Washington DC. The theme is "Building a Healthier Future."  I look forward to participating in a breakout session Friday morning, March 8.

The True Cost of Healthier Choices (Room: Constitution A)
Obesity prevalence among shoppers visiting budget supermarkets was three times higher than the obesity prevalence among shoppers visiting higher-price supermarkets. Does a healthy diet cost more than an unhealthy diet? It depends on how you measure it. As food prices rise, how can we not compromise nutrition by insuring access to healthy food?

Moderator:

• Lisa Sutherland, President, LA Sutherland Group

Panelists:

• Andrea Carlson, Economist, USDA Economic Research Service
• Janet McLaughlin, Senior Director, Share Our Strength’s Cooking Matters®
• Parke Wilde,... Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Tufts University

An earlier post on the U.S. Food Policy blog offers some approaches to thinking about the cost of healthy food, along with links to other reading and resources.  Andrea Carlson and Elizabeth Frazao published a USDA report on food costs in May 2012, which this blog discussed at the time.  The Cooking Matters program from Share Our Strength has resources for healthy, affordable meals.

Following the breakout sessions Friday morning, First Lady Michelle Obama is giving the keynote Friday afternoon. There are many other great breakout sessions throughout the summit.

Healthy food not more expensive

In contrast with the conventional wisdom that healthy food costs too much, USDA's Economic Research Service this week reports:

For all metrics except the price of food energy, the authors find that healthy foods cost less than less healthy foods (defined for this study as foods that are high in saturated fat, added sugar, and/or sodium, or that contribute little to meeting dietary recommendations).

The argument turns largely on three different methods of measuring the cost of food:

• price per unit of weight ($ / 100g of edible weight)
• price per serving ($ per cup or ounce equivalent)
• price per unit of food energy (cents per Calorie)

Based on the third method, people frequently say healthy food is too expensive.  Based mainly on the first two methods, USDA argues instead that healthy food is reasonably inexpensive.

You might think this is a delightfully arcane and nerdy point of contention.  Yet, the new study has major news coverage today, including a surprisingly complete explanation of this whole units issue.  The Wall Street Journal quotes one of the report's authors, my colleague Andi Carlson:

Often, less-healthy food options are made up of empty calories, prompting people to eat even more, said Andrea Carlson, lead researcher of the report.

"Take a chocolate glazed donut which is 240 calories," she said. "You can easily eat one, if not two or three without any trouble at all. However, a banana, which has a lot of nutrients in it and will make you feel quite full, has only 105 calories. You will feel fuller if you eat the banana versus the donut."

I can think of reasons to like each measurement method in certain circumstances.  Beverages provide an example of a comparison where it seems the per-serving approach is sensible.  If we compare the cost of milk to sugary soda, a per-Calorie comparison makes soda look cheaper when it really just has more Calories.  The per-serving comparison better captures the choice consumers really face.

On the other hand, if you think of the cost of a day's food supply, consumers' bodies generally regulate total food energy intake.  For such comparisons, perhaps price per unit of food energy does make some sense.

For those who want more detail, here is a summary graphic from the USDA report.  It is a bit complex.  Generally, the high-carbohydrate category is fairly inexpensive, which corroborates the conventional wisdom.  But, the fruit and vegetable categories are less expensive than meat by the preferred second and third measurement methods, which is USDA's main point.

A skeptical question about financial speculation and food prices

Tom Philpott at Mother Jones blames food price increases since 2007 on financial speculators.  He is quite harsh on the fools like me, who thought rising food prices reflected resource scarcity.

Here is my question in his comments section:

I don't understand how speculation could raise food prices for more than a few months. 

The financial speculators are placing bets on the futures market.  If they expect prices to go up in January, they will buy a contract today that guarantees them a certain amount of commodity in January.  When January comes around, they sell their paper commodities on the ordinary spot market.  If they are correct that prices rose, they make a profit, because their January sale is more than the price they originally paid. 

An essential feature of this game is that the speculators do not want to take possession of a ton of corn or soybeans.  For speculators, the game is not "buying and more buying," it is "buying and then selling."  The buying drives up prices, and the selling drives down prices.  Commodity futures are different from "dot com" stocks, which can be held for a long time.

Basically, I find it much more plausible -- as an economist and as an environmentalist -- to see rising food prices as a symptom of real resource scarcity.

But I'll keep an open mind.  Can somebody explain more clearly: beyond the first few months of a speculative boom, how can financial speculators keep driving the price higher and higher?

Mark Bittman asks if junk food is really cheaper

Mark Bittman's column this week in the New York Times argues that junk food is not really cheaper.  For a reader who is skeptical, Bittman's rhetorical method is to provide an array of examples, each of which has different advantages. 

In general, despite extensive government subsidies, hyperprocessed food remains more expensive than food cooked at home. You can serve a roasted chicken with vegetables along with a simple salad and milk for about $14, and feed four or even six people. If that’s too much money, substitute a meal of rice and canned beans with bacon, green peppers and onions; it’s easily enough for four people and costs about $9. (Omitting the bacon, using dried beans, which are also lower in sodium, or substituting carrots for the peppers reduces the price further, of course.) 

The column concludes with both a cultural agenda and policy prescription.  Do you like one, or the other, or neither, or both?