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Infants, Toddlers, & Preschoolers
Can your child be starving and fat at the same time?
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Anonymous
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low education levels go hand in hand with poverty. Moms buying this crap are probably ignorant to the connection between diet and health. She's going to have even bigger problems when on Medicare with a daughter that has diabetes at age 7. It really is a vicious cycle of no education=poverty=illness. She'll never get the connection. Sorry to sound harsh, but what in the HECK is someone on food stamps doing buying juicy juice? Uh, maybe some tap water might be a more economical option if people are starving. I'm having a hard time mustering up sympathy.
I'll never understand this processed food is cheaper thing. Whenever I fill my cart with convenience food, I'm always stunned when I get to the check out line. Tonight dinner's probably going to cost us $8. Chicken, potato, broccoli. My husband just groans when he sees it. No fun, but we busted our food budget this weekend going out to eat and it's all basics for a week at my house. |
Anonymous
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OP, what a insensitive post - are you just trying to get people riled up and offended? Nice, calling people's children "sumo wrestlers" - I think that's racist in itself.
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Anonymous
Where does it say she's buying Juicy Juice in the article? Sure, there are people who probably spend their food stamp money on junk, but the woman in this article actually sounds like she's trying to feed her family healthy things. The only junk she buys is for her daughter's birthday party - a bag of chips and a bag of popcorn, plus some fruit roll ups which her daughter asks for. Other than that it is milk, yogurt, frozen OJ, bread. HEr dinner plan "spaghetti, macaroni and cheese, sloppy Joes, tacos and chicken nuggets, plus mixed vegetables with each meal" is not the healthiest, but I have certainly served all those things to my kids at one time. I am just able to buy better quality meat and the soy nuggets. |
Anonymous
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There are lots of people on public assistance in my neighborhood. 3 out of 4 trips to the grocery store, I'm behind someone paying with food stamps. And I have never once seen one of these people buying fruit and vegetables, either fresh or frozen. At best, there are some cans of beans. But it's mostly sugary cereal, snack foods, juice-like products (not real juice), and high-quality meat.
My mom once got a local business to donate the use of an empty lot in a poor urban area for a public garden; she organized the tilling and improvement of the soil, and planted an enormous vegetable garden with the help of some friends. The whole community was invited to participate in the planting, tending, and harvesting of this garden, for free. Mom and the other church ladies did all the planting. And then that produce rotted on the vine. A lack of time, education, and motivation means that some populations aren't even interested in FREE healthy food. She also (many years earlier) volunteered to teach a free class on "cheap cooking" at a local church/community center. It was supposed to be a four-week class; she showed up and sat in an empty classroom for the first two weeks, then she stopped going. It's not PC to say it, but families on public assistance who try to make the most of their food stamps dollars through healthful eating are the exception, not the rule. And in all fairness, calorie for calorie, junk food is cheaper. I think the most recent numbers I read put it at one to five. (One good calorie costs the same as five bad ones.) I agree that receiving food stamps should be contingent on learning how to manage a food budget and make healthy choices. Alternatively, the training could be incentivized, instead of mandated-- ie, give more money to recipients who complete the training. |
Anonymous
Why the hating on B.E.? No, seriously. Is your objection to Nickel & Dimed or to her in general? I don't know her work well, only read N&D, which I found somewhat self-serving but interesting. I am really curious to hear your critique. (Because this board tends to be snarky and mean, let me add that I'm totally serious and in no way spoiling for a fight, although we will obviously at least to some extent disagree.) |
Anonymous
Not true at all--in some places you can even use food stamps--which are now distributed electronically, and used like a debit/credit card--at farmer's markets. Not sure if this is the case anywhere in the DC area, but I know that when I did a report on nutrition assistance for the elderly back in 2001ish many states were trying to make this an easier option for people on assistance. |
Anonymous
Oh my God! Barbara Ehrenreich. I read N & D too and I could write a 10 page critique, I'm not the PP, but gee.. everyone I know read this book and found it total BS! The woman is a spoiled, checked out idiot. Her books should be considered fiction. |
Anonymous
So Sumo Wrestler is racist? How about fat pig? Is that insulting to farm animals? |
Anonymous
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If you read the article, several things pop up in my mind. Even more striking than the diet is who goes and buy a new Honda Civic with nearly a $300 payment when their entire budget is $1200 per month? I drove a junker for years after college until I made enough to afford a car payment.
Food Stamps were not intended to be your total food budget, so you need to figure out priorities like: rent, food, utilities, etc. While transportation might be important, driving a new car is not. The other thing that was striking is that if you add up all the costs she has a month, it exceeds her income by $100, yet she doesn't mention some obvious other expenses like her clothing, non-taxable items you can't purchase with Food Stamps. I see people all the time in line at the market who are paying with food stamps and there will be 2 boxes of ice cream, huge packs of shrimp, chips, and all kinds of microwave dinners, etc. No veggies, no fruit, nothing of value. If I only had $55 a week for groceries I would have to cook from scratch, grains, some meat, milk, bananas, eggs. Nothing processed. We grew up extremely poor and my parents got food stamps. They would have never bought microwave dinners. They bought the basics and made them last. |
Anonymous
| Now you've got us all curious. Someone please give an (objective) review of N & D! It actually sounds like an interesting topic.... |
Anonymous
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Her children are dependent on the Federal School lunch and breakfast programs. Those meals are VERY high in fat.
A recent article in the Post noted that many local school districts are moving away from fresh foods and healthy foods because of the recent increases in food prices. Also, her kids are not starving. They may be malnourished, and they may be eating too much high fat food while striving for nutrients, but they are not starving. Getting enough nutrition on low quality food will always lead a person to eat too many calories. Next time you are in a store, read the label on the cheap peanut butter and on the pricy peanut butter. Guess which has more peanuts and less palm. |
Anonymous
Patrick Beaudry wrote the following review and I have to say it's dead on, couldn't have said it better myself: Before I read this book, I had heard fantastic reviews and nothing but good things regarding what Barbara Ehrenreich had to say regarding her experiences. Imagine my surprise and disappointment when I actually read the book. Barbara Ehrenreich has a PhD. If you don't know that, don't worry, she'll remind you every two pages or so about her obvious superiority to her "fellow workers", whom she treats with both disrespect and condescension ("I am, of course, very different from the people who normally fill America's least attractive jobs"). After about a week or so of her "experiment", she starts to spout Marx and Lenin as if this was 1917 and we were all Russian peasants. It's obvious to me that Barbara (or Babs, as she becomes about half-way through the book) had a preconceived idea about what kind of book she wanted to write, and she went out of her way to write just that book. 1. She starts her "poverty experiment" in Key West, Florida. Since Key West is one of the most expensive cities in the US, it's no shock that she had a tough time here. Saying its difficult to live as a waitress in Key West is like saying it's difficult to get a decent apartment in Manhattan 2. Her next pick, a few months later, is Portland, Maine. Leaving aside for the time being the fact that she has to come up with first and last months rent twice in three months is a pretty good indicator of her ability to manage her money. (Perhaps she would do better without moving around so much). This being August, the height of the tourist season, her choice of Maine is tantamount to picking The Hamptons or Laguna Beach. Competing with the tourists for housing doesn't give an indication of affordability of housing in America; it's just an indicator of how expensive it is to be a tourist. 3. I'm really surprised about her next pick, Minnesota, not for where it is, but why. Her thought of going to California was nixed, not for practical reasons, but based on "My worry that the Latinos might be hogging all the crap jobs and substandard housing for themselves". WOW! We've got a real open minded one here. 4. Her refusal to take a drug test for Winn-Dixie in Florida is based on her refusal to "submit to the indignity" of peeing in a cup for a perfect stranger. Only later on does she discuss her "Chemical Indiscretion" that would show up in a drug test. I guess it's an indignity to get caught with drugs in your system, right Babs? It must be pretty tough to make ends meet with all your cash going for weed and beer. 5. As she is quitting each and every job, she makes it a point to tell her co-workers that she is a PhD, and she is only doing this for a book. Imagine how surprised she is each time to find out no one cares. It's as if she is saying "Don't you see, I don't belong here...I'm better than you". (Please see first paragraph regarding her over qualification to hold America's least attractive jobs). Overall, this is just an exercise in overindulgence and journalistic deceit designed to produce a preconceived outcome that the author took special pains to arrange. It's a shame, because an honest experiment and an honest book would have been so much more educational and enlightening. |
Anonymous
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Thank you. That was really interesting. I agree that she ginned up her experiment somewhat and I also found her tone occasionally annoying for the reasons he mentions.
I don't particularly agree with some of the critic's points, though: Marx is perfectly relevant to a book on the exploitation of workers; so Maine in August and Key West are expensive -- there are still waitresses and housecleaners trying to make ends meet there; so what if she had a double motive for refusing a drug test? the existence of the drug test for a job of that description was news to me and probably to other readers. The critic doesn't give her any credit for exposing some of the hidden costs of poverty (hence Nickel & Dimed). But I do see why he found the book disappointing and annoying. (Although I think his own tone could use a little moderation...) |
Anonymous
| It's amazing to me how nosy some of you are. I can't remember an occasion when I made note of how someone was paying for their purchase, much less scan their purchases for nutrional content. Entirely TOO much time on your hands. |
Anonymous
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