[bobcostas55]

Literally every single poor person pictured is obese. That baby is almost certainly going to be overweight in a few years.

I'm amazed this isn't a bigger issue politically. Nutrition is a huge driver of health inequality. In 50 years the obesity rate has quadrupled. A return to the eating habits of the 1960s is perhaps the greatest possible welfare achievement right now (in the US), with impact far larger than universal healthcare. And it doesn't need to cost anything.

[jnbiche]

To fix poverty among the poor, you'll have to do a whole lot more than just convince them to eat healthy:

1) Healthy food where I live is much more expensive than unhealthy food. I get that in SF and NYC, it's possible to buy such food at Asian grocers for a reasonable cost, but not everyone is fortunate enough to have an Asian grocer on their corner. So they'll need more money.

2) On a related note, many poor neighborhoods don't even have a grocery store within walking distance, and many poor Americans own no car.

3) Unless somehow the food is pre-cooked (unlikely), they'll need the time to prepare it. Many poor people work 2 jobs, and I know of some single mothers working 2 FT minimum-wage jobs. These are investment banker hours. They don't have time to cook.

4) Many poor people also don't have working stoves/ranges, just microwaves or hot plates. It's much harder to cook healthy food in microwaves, although it can be done.

5) The also need to learn how to cook new healthy foods, which isn't always easy.

6) Finally, and this is a big one, but it's very stressful to live life as a poor American. Many people both rich and poor stress eat, so that is another factor here.

Anyway, not sure what you're suggesting, but if it's just that someone needs to tell those poor people to eat better, it's not always so easy. But I do agree with you it would be great if it were possible to work on some of the challenges above. 3)

[harryh]

Re #4:

96.6% of US households below the poverty level have a working stove.

https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/terence-p-jeffrey/censu...

[jnbiche]

A lot of people living in subsidized housing will have a stove, because Section 8 requires it from landlords. However, I know a lot of people who may be slightly above the poverty line who don't have a working stove. That included me for a while.

[harryh]

It would be very unusual for access to an appliance to decrease as income rises. Do you have any data to support that claim beyond your individual experience?

[jnbiche]

Did you not read what I just wrote? Section 8 housing requires these appliances. But you have to be below a certain income level to quality for Section 8 housing. It would be very reasonable to assume that once your income is above that required for Section 8 housing ($36,000 for family of 4), then if your appliance broke, it might be difficult to replace it because you don't have several thousand dollars lying around. If you've never tried to raise a family of 4 on ~$37,000, let me assure you that you will likely run into that situation sometimes.

But no, other than my personal experience, I have no data to support my claim. Just as you have none to support your counter-claim.

[harryh]

Re #2:

You are talking about so called food deserts. There are a lot of reasons to be skeptical of this hypothesis. Here is a good academic article that is representative:

http://chicagopolicyreview.org/2015/10/26/if-you-build-it-th...

[jnbiche]

Yeah, in that article they basically say it's likely one factor among many, which is exactly what I'm saying.

[harryh]

They say that it is a very minor factor.

[jnbiche]

Well, thank god that we don't have the replication crisis hasn't engulfed economics, and that we can totally rely on the conclusions reached by a single working paper.

http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/03/about-40-economics-ex...

But in any case, among all the factors I listed, I agree that it's probably the smallest factors. In fact, I didn't even initially list that factor, and only came back and inserted it after my initial post. So the fact that it's a small factor doesn't refute any of the other ones.

Last comment from me. You go ahead and rebut all you want. But if you think getting poor people to eat better is just a matter of educating them and instilling a sense of self-discipline, you're quite wrong. Like many difficult problems, this one has multiple causal factors.

[dragonwriter]

> A return to the eating habits of the 1960s is perhaps the greatest possible welfare achievement right now (in the US), with impact far larger than universal healthcare.

You are comparing a concrete policy with a policy outcome for which there is no even remote concept of a policy mechanism that would achieve it.

> And it doesn't need to cost anything.

Massive changes to behavior are not free; the changes in eating habits that happened since the 1969s were driven by a number of economic and other factors, and counteracting all those factors to drive people back to 1960s eating habits would not be cheap.

[mobilefriendly]

Actually there are plenty of policy mechanisms to improve nutrition. First repeal subsidy programs for corn and sugar, in particular remove the U.S. import tariffs that create a market for high fructose corn syrup. Next end food stamp coverage for junk food and sugar drinks. Further, allow insurers, medicaid, etc surcharge for the obese-- make them pay for the extra costs they are imposing on the system. Consider taxes on sugar drinks. Finally improve school lunch nutrition.

[dragonwriter]

> Actually there are plenty of policy mechanisms to improve nutrition

I didn't say there weren't.

I said that there was no policy mechanism identified to acheive the goal of returning to 1960s eating habits.

> Further, allow insurers, medicaid, etc surcharge for the obese

Especially in the case of Medicaid, which is a safety net program for the medically indigent, this is nothing short of murderous.

[harryh]

I would also add:

- regulate advertisements for unhealthy foods, especially ads targeted at children

- ban vending machines (and candy sales) on school campuses

- implement sugar taxes similar to cigarette taxes

[death_and_taxes]

Cheap access to truly healthy food would be the most amazing social program, and probably have outsized benefits for its cost.