Posted on 06/14/2016 7:01:33 AM PDT by RightGeek
For several years, so-called "food deserts"—low-income neighborhoods devoid of nutritious food options—were an oft-cited culprit for America's high obesity levels. Everyone from state senators to Michelle Obama had ideas about how to fix the issue, from launching new farmer's markets in these neighborhoods to state grant programs designed to entice more fruit-and-veggie offerings to bans on new fast-food restaurants opening in these areas. The kicker was a multi-million dollar federal initiative, spearheaded by the First Lady, to promote farmer's markets and attract more grocery-store chains to food-desert neighborhoods.
"Since 2011, the Federal Government has spent almost $500 million to improve food store access in neighborhoods lacking large, well-stocked grocery stores," according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). [SNIP]
The theory was simple: poor people simply lacked easy access to healthy food options. If you put fruits, vegetables, and whole grains in front of them, they would soon be singing the praises of Michael Pollan, too. And voila: no more obesity epidemic in these neighborhoods.
But of course things didn't work out that way. As many business owners in these neighborhoods and other food-desert skeptics have pointed out, the problem wasn't that they simply hadn't thought to offer more wholesome items. The problem was that these items just didn't sell. You can lead human beings to Whole Foods, but you can't make them buy organic kale there.
The USDA just admitted as much, with a new report on food deserts. Highlights note that proximity to supermarkets "has a limited impact on food choices" and "household and neighborhood resources, education, and taste preferences may be more important determinants of food choice than store proximity."
(Excerpt) Read more at reason.com ...
Half a billion dollars would have been a good start
on the Wall.
Has anyone noticed that food deserts and hardware store deserts occur in the same areas?
I can see the point. In inner cities there aren’t a lot of options for grocery stores, meaning less expensive food. Small shops often charge more. The big secret is the grocery stores in these areas charge more too. It’s because they’re feeding off the government food stamp system. If go to the ‘burbs or rural areas the prices are cheaper, less food stamps being used.
The idea of food deserts did come from any sort of study, it was entirely made up by Ms. Obama.
Everyone needs to remember that Michelle Obama’s college theses title was:
WHY I HATE AMERICA
Poptarts
It’s true, we ate whatever, but we were always playing until our moms called us in. You had chubby kids, but not severely obese kids like now. There was a pre school kid next to my room. He was so big he looked like a 4th grader.
You can Google & see that it was called that after a 1999 UK study. Opinion is one thing....a fact a whole other animal.
So, they spent $500 million dollars to get to this point.
Next, we will be told that they must GIVE AWAY (”free”) the healthy foods in these areas. This will require some new funding on our part, which will be in addition to all of the programs already out there for food stamps, feed the children 3 meals a day at school, feed the children all summer, etc. When the “poor people” will not take the FREE fruits and vegetables, we will be told that we must pay to have them cleaned, peeled, cut, and prepared in order to entice the “poor people” to actually eat those foods. Good thing Michelle is running out of time on this.
Oh, so this study said that these things exist in the United States? NO! She had absolutely no data to suggest that this was an actual problem in the US. Shortly after she started talking about “food deserts” some one looked at the actual demographics and found that there was no such thing. She made up the idea that this was a problem that affected the American population.
“Whenever the shrink numbers from shoplifting get too high, a low-margin grocery business can’t survive, and the store closes.”
When we moved to inside the Beltway on the Prince George’s side, we were amazed at how many of the locals would walk through the supermarkets grazing on the fruit, cookies and chips. You could find open bags of snacks on nearly every shelf.
It’s no wonder stores move out of those areas. About the only way to stop that is to use the Soviet model of stores, where the customer goes to the counter, hands a clerk a shopping list, pays, and then the clerk gets what’s on the list.
Did anyone ask the groceries who used to be in the food desert locations why they closed their stores? How about the grocery companies who have ruled out those locations for building new stores?
Thou doth protest too much. Admit you were too lazy to take the 10 seconds it took me to look it up & that you pulled it out of your bum. We all have done it, most of us laughingly go,”Oops, my bad.” Some of us get mad & get all riled up & try to blame their humiliation on the person who called them on their mistake.
Guess which one you are.... ; )
What she said was that poor neighborhoods had a lower number of grocery stores per square mile than richer neighborhoods. That is what she said. There had been no study to say that that was true. When it was studied after she said it, he assertion was found to be false. She made he assertion not based on any study.
I remember reading that obesity is the number one health problem among America’s poor.
Think about that.
Planning does usually give better results then impulse.
A trip to the mega-low mart for me requires planning so I go with a list, (now generated from the store's web site with some coupons attached) other coupons I pick up here and there and a meal plan in mind.
There is also the fact that people who go to a large store generally cook which results in their making better selections.
Actually with computers there is almost no administrative burden to taking EBT, WIC, SNAP or any other government program.
Now if your store is not computerized then you are up a creek.
If people in inner city neighborhoods wanted tofu or peaches - someone would open a store and sell it. It's how capitalism works... the invisible hand delivers what people want to buy.’
Anyone notice that large number of stores in inner cities that sell beer and wine?
Interesting. In the old Frankford/Tacony neighborhood we had "Hucksters". Guys with pickups who would get fresh produce from growers in NJ (at least back in the early to mid 60's) and drive up and down the driveways of these multiple neighborhoods yelling their produce for sale. Driveways might be misleading for some...these were like streets between the row homes of Philly neighborhoods. Every "driveway" between these two streets would separate 60+ homes.
At one time the hucksters all had booming voices and just belted out what they had for sale that day. One guy in particular had such a booming voice and pattern that it was a pleasure hearing him. It was very jarring when they started using amplified systems or music jingles. Interesting times.
All they had to do was send an observer into a Walmart and look in the shopping carts of all the fat women.
You can lead a ho to culture but you can’t make her think.
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