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Complex carbohydrates are cheap. Fat is cheap. Eating simple carbohydrates is not an economic choice.

Vitamins pills and vegetables are reasonably cheap. And anyway if deficiencies caused obesity, the rate would drop off dramatically over some threshold income.

Lotteries matter because that's where poor Americans spend about 10% of their income. Taxing the rich to destruction will not fix that.



They're not as cheap though, are they? Here are a couple of articles on poverty, obesity and cheap calories that you might find interesting:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/14/obesity-...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-mark-hyman/not-having-enoug...

10% of a poor person's income turns out to be about $25/week according to this article: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2123448/Poorest-peop.... Hardly earth shattering or likely to lift them out of poverty if they somehow manage to save it.


Yes, in fact good food can be extremely cheap. Beans, eggs, and butter are dirt cheap. Canned vegetables are affordable if you buy for nutrition (i.e., not empty food like green beans).

Re. lottery spending, they are losing $12 a week! That is $600 a year! That could buy premium multivitamins, an extra several eggs a day, rather a lot of cheese, with money left over for the occassional meal out.

The problem of most poor Americans is not resources, it is the deployment of them.




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