Fast Food Now a Luxury, Says 78% of Americans
Fast Food Now a Luxury, Says 78% of Americans
The best economy ever is when nobody can afford even low quality foods and services
I look it like a race between propaganda and people thinking about what’s in front of them. And the propaganda has one hell of a head start and is borderline unshakable
I had the biggest positive indicator I've seen yet just yesterday at work. A guy I work with who is in his mid 50s loudly stated that he believes anyone who is a corporate landlord should be slapped with fines so stiff that it becomes impossible to be one until there are no more houseless people in the area in which they are a landlord.
I could have died right there in my seat. It's the FIRST time I've ever heard anyone in silicon valley say anything even remotely positive about something that isn't "hurdur capitalism #1 best in da werl"
In capitalism it's more plausible to imagine the end of the world via nukes flying than human needs like housing, food, clothing and shelter being free.
Growing up, the main stigma they fed us about fast food was (correctly) how unhealthy it is.
Over time, the main stigma shifted to how financially irresponsible it is to eat fast food. There are popular "financial literacy" channels on YouTube where the host just yells at people for having the audacity to eat Taco Bell.
When I was younger, I enjoyed watching this local TV show "Luxury Trap" (translated from the original Swedish "Lyxfällan") as kind of a guilty pleasure. I am not gonna lie, I watched it for the "feel good factor" of "at least I am not as miserable as these people" - which is probably the reason most people watch it. The whole premise is that these self-proclaimed financial experts help people who are in deep debt to get back on their feet by helping them sell valuables and pay off the worst in short term, and set up a pay off plan for the long term, and then bam, all fixed. Along the way there is a lot of shaming the indebted people for their life choices, mainly stuff like buying fast food, snacks, and sometimes some bad spending habits or gambling problems. It's a 30 minute formula that always gets happily resolved by the end, and is followed up ONCE after one month with a perfect "thank you I'm cured" response, the entire theater part is thinner than a white guy's skin. It's just milked for drama all the way through.
Every episode follows the exact same formula and after a while you start to understand that it's all about just kicking down on the people who have deeper issues than just being slightly irresponsible with their snack money, having been ground down by the shitty life they are dealt, but it sells like crack, they are probably at something like season 30 now. Disgusting, really, even if I personally find fast food to be devil's work
I really hate that show. It has done immense harm miseducating the public about what poverty is and what it looks like. The people on the show are never truly poor, they always have a reasonable income and some assets. Many of them are home owners. And they're presented like absolute clowns whose only problem is being too stupid to do basic math.
The show never explores issues of mental health or economic marginalisation. The people on the show never have trouble finding gainful employment, if needed the show runners will set up interviews for them. People on the show never experience unforeseen expenses and it is never explored how hard frugality actually is in a society where everyone seems hellbent on making you spend money all the time.
No, poverty can be solved simply by selling your dumbass second caravan and stop eating fastfood every night.
There are popular "financial literacy" channels on YouTube where the host just yells at people for having the audacity to eat Taco Bell.
They're the most affordable restaurant in my entire city I think. Pretty much only accessible by car though.
I think I marathoned the one you're talking about for a couple months just to have something in the background while I worked (they're relatively young and from Texas).
While he usually didn't go as far to say that eating out was preventing people from buying homes, he always loved to talk about how everyone can save money even if it means 0 treats for years at a time. As if that isn't completely unrealistic. Oh but sure, let's put $100 in the budget for once a month therapy, otherwise the commenters will get mad - what do you mean that's not enough to help you cope with 50-60 hours of work??? And then when someone does come to him already scrapping at the bottom and budgeting to the max (for example, he had a single guardian on there that had to adopt younger family members due to a dysfunctional sister) he just says sorry and then gives them extremely unhelpful advice like get a third job (he ALWAYS tells people to get side gigs and second jobs and this lady already had two jobs, eventually what got me to stop watching ugh) or to look up local resources like food banks for help (she already was).
I only watched as long as I did because he had wealthy shithead libertarians and toxic masculinity guys that would buy 60k trucks and teslas. Assholes that usually made more than enough money but always had mommy and/or employees do all the work for them so they never ended up learning any of the basics themselves. But whenever someone making $50k or less a year comes on... yikes.
industrial food-adjacent slop is aspirational now
economy's doing great
: “don’t you see? Shareholder value has NEVER BEEN HIGHER! EVERYTHING has gone up in value! Aren’t you excited? You have bought stocks, right?”Can I eat the stocks?
capitalism no borgar
MFW to add insult to injury, I just got reminded of the existence of food deserts. So this is just purely diabolical.
hexbear: unlimited genocide on the first world!
monkey paw curls
Sometimes you have to crack an egg to make an omelette (even if you won’t be around to enjoy the omelette)
Anything can be a luxury if your price gouge enough
25% GANG
spoiler
I've been cooking at home so much the past year. It's nice - I like it - but it's funny how I no longer have the "eh, I'll just head to work and grab something there" attitude. Must make lunch, must prep sandwich or leftovers, must not pay 14 dollars for some fast casual slop.
It doesn't help most of the halfway-decent fast food deals are buried in apps, which is just insane to me. If you just show up at a place, you're getting fucked now, which just.... what is this?
i get a pizza once every 2 or 2 and a half weeks. chinese takeout once a month. wonder where the hell that puts me? some weird fraction?
Although that food is fast I don’t think it is fast food as commonly understood. Unless your pizza is Sbarro’s and your Chinese is Panda Express
7 or more?! How does anyone do that? Like, if nothing else, you'd just get sick of eating it and want something nice for a change, surely.
It probably also includes getting coffee. People love their Starbucks or Dunkin
pffft, the empire doesn't need bread or circus, everything will hold just fine
I have decided I am going to replace fast food with baked beans that come out of a can, and some chopped up sausages fried up on the stove.
Fast food is all garbage and they're charging sit-down restaurant prices. Why the fuck would I go to McDonalds when there's a Chili's next door that offers more food for less money?
Cause I've got 15 minutes not 45?
Order it online ahead of time and just pick it up to go.
They have take-out you know, just order ahead
My partner and kids really love fastfood and I feel like I'm being royally swindled every time I buy it. So much money for that bullshit? I could've made a meal fit for a king for the same money and still have some left to buy dessert.
It's so Joever
Covid was just the catalyst the bourgeois needed to destroy the world lmao nothing has been the same since
Maybe I was raised particularly poor but fast food's always been a luxury to me. Now it's just... not quite unaffordable, but like it's over $30 for two mchikun combos or whatever from McZionism's® and frankly fuck that shit.
work hard and save up and you could treat yourself to a puck of poultry byproduct slurry and corn syrup
i used to get fast food a lot but i pretty much exclusively eat microwave slop meals now. i don't really know how to cook and i don't really want to learn because of sensory issues relating to food and handling the various biological slimes and oils and cold wet ingredients. i'm like one step above eating nothing but ramen. my diet is nearly exclusively spicy chicken/potato slop bowls since literally everything else in the frozen meal aisle is either some kind of mac and cheese which i hate (the sound of hollow noodles triggers my misophonia and i will forever resent the Perfidious Italian for daring to combine cheese and noodles) or is too expensive.
i used to eat that way until i shacked up with my partner who would rather die than let me eat that way
she has probably lengthened my life by many years just by knocking that slop out of my hands
Slopgang representing
I feel bad wasting money every day I work on a medium soda and a medium french fry. I've become semi-dependent on the carbs and especially that ice in the drink as it gets hotter.
Fucking 7.50 though. For a fry and a drink. It's fucking wild.
And I can't help but notice that there's only ever 2 people working the place anymore. Minus the shift manager at their traditional role of napping in the office.
Been mostly so poor since the 90s that fast food has always been a luxury. We would take our kid "out to eat" maybe once in a few months and it was always fast food. But food prices have been different here I suppose (nordics).
yeah when I was a kid McDonald's was out of the question
I think I only ever had it one time from ages 0 - 13
Truly a luxury product
I feel like any sensible society should consider it a luxury to have a meal (of whatever quality) produced in the amount of time it takes for a car to drive from a speaker to a drive-through window potentially 24 hours a day anywhere they go. Imagine if that level of production efficiency were put toward something more socially useful than convenience food delivery speed to drivers. Like, imagine if you had to wait a few minutes longer to order a burger, but instead medical appointment wait times were shorter.
I disagree. Assuming fewer chains and less overall bloat, places where workers can get food on/near on demand seems quite useful. Whether it’s a cafeteria or a stack of food delivered through a window, I don’t see why it’s bad. It’s an economic niche.
it's also not that magical. quick serve cafeterias and soup/smother lines have been around forever. the fast food logistical system is about fordist replaceable labor, product branding/uniformity over great distances, and adding pizazz/fluff to the lowest tier quality ingredients.
there's a Cajun joint by my house where you can get any of like 12 different options (jambalaya, gumbo, etouffee, etc) with rice and toasted garlic bread for a reasonable price and it comes out the window in less than 4 minutes after you pay. it is not high tech lol.
And how would that work exactly? Are we routing fast food workers to clinics instead?
I'm not suggesting it would be as simple as dropping untrained fast food workers into clinics and calling it a day, but broadly: yes, I think diverting many of the workers currently required to keep fast food places operating into healthcare jobs (for example) would probably produce a greater net social benefit than my ability to have a burger handed to me through my car window within 2 minutes of ordering it in every town in the US.
Over here, fast food prices have risen more slowly than groceries :/
It's unironically quite expensive when I hear friends talking about it. Being vegan has made me mostly just make my own food, so I only hear about the price hikes
there's a battle on reddit economy, economics, and inflation subs among feds vs real people where feds try to gaslight everyone into thinking the economy is good
That's them Bidenomics