"The Role of Taxpayer Subsidies in the Obesity Epidemic"
The rise in calorie surplus sufficient to explain the obesity epidemic
was less a change in food quantity than in food quality,
with an explosion in cheap, high-calorie, low-quality convenience foods.
And the federal government very much played a role in making it happen.
U.S. taxpayers give billions in subsidies to prop up the likes of the sugar industry;
the corn industry and their high-fructose corn syrup;
and soybean production, about half of which is processed into vegetable oil,
and the other half used as cheap feed to help make dollar-menu meat.
Why do taxpayers give nearly a quarter billion dollars
a year to the sorghum industry?
When was the last time you sat down to some sorghum?
It's almost all fed to livestock.
We've created a pricing structure that favors the production
of sugars, oil, and animal products.
The farm bill started out as an emergency measure
during the Great Depression of the 1930s
to protect small farmers, but was weaponized by Big Ag
into a cash cow with pork barrel politics—
including said producers of cows and pork.
From 1970 to 1994 global beef prices dropped more than 60%.
If it weren’t for taxpayers sweetening the pot with billions of dollars a year,
high-fructose corn syrup would cost the soda industry about 12% more.
And then of course we hand them more billions
through the “food stamp” program to give sugary drinks to the poor.
Why is chicken so cheap?
After one of the farm bills, corn and soy were subsidized
below the cost of production for cheap animal fodder,
effectively handing the poultry and pork industry about $10 billion each.
That’s not chicken feed— or rather, it is!
This is changing what we eat. Thanks in part to subsidies,
dairy, meats, sweets, eggs, oils, and soda were all getting relatively cheaper
compared to the overall consumer food price index
as the obesity epidemic took off;
whereas the relative cost of fresh fruits and vegetables doubled.
This may help explain why during about the same period
the percentage of Americans getting even five servings
of fruits and vegetables a dropped from 42% to 26%.
Why not just subsidize produce instead?
Because that’s not where the money is.
To understand what's shaping our foodscape today,
it's important to understand the significance of differential profit.
Whole foods, or minimally processed foods
such as canned beans or tomato paste,
are what’s referred to in the food business as “commodities.”
They have such a slim profit margin sometimes they’re even sold at
or below cost as “loss leaders” to attract customers in hopes
they’ll also buy the “value added” products.
Some of the most profitable for producers and vendors alike
are the ultra-processed fatty/sugary/salty concoctions
of artificially flavored, artificially colored, and artificially
cheap ingredients thanks to taxpayer subsidies.
Different foods reap different returns.
Measured in profit per square foot of supermarket selling space,
confectionaries like candy bars consistently
rank among the most lucrative.
The markups are the only healthy thing about them, though.
Fried snacks like potato and corn chips are also highly profitable.
PepsiCo’s subsidiary Frito-Lay brags that while their products
represented only about 1% of total supermarket sales,
they may account for more than 10% of operating proﬁts
for supermarkets and 40% of proﬁt growth.
It’s no surprise, then, that the entire system is geared towards garbage.
The rise in the calorie supply wasn’t just more food, but a different kind of food.
There’s a dumb dichotomy about the drivers of the obesity epidemic:
Is it the sugar or is it the fat?
They’re both highly subsidized and they both took off.
Along with a significant rise in refined grain products
that’s difficult to quantify, the rise in obesity was accompanied
by about a 20% increase in per capita pounds
of added sugars, and a 38% increase in added fats.
More than half of all calories consumed by most adults in the United States
were found to originate from these subsidized foods,
and they appear to be worse off for it.
Those eating the most had significantly higher levels
of chronic disease risk factors including elevated cholesterol,
inflammation, and body weight.