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Comment by codeddesign | Hacker News Reader

Try to eat ramen noodles for the rest of your life and see how your health goes. Most health issues today are directly related to diet. However, processed food and snacks are much cheaper (ramen noodles) than healthy alternatives. McDonald's is a lot cheaper than going to the store and cooking a meal. So no, food is not cheaper when you try to compare it against healthcare.

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I used ramen noodle as an example. There are plenty types of food that you can buy for cheap. Are you really telling me that for a family of 4, your grocery bill will be $1500/month ? That is the average cost that I was paying out of pocket for a good plan (with low deductibles etc). And yes, I have kids which makes it absolutely critical to have a really good plan.

My grocery bill for 4 of us goes about $500/month and that too when we are not really into coupons and stuff.

I wasn't arguing healthcare, I was arguing your analogy. Food is a right but so is air. However, the quality of it drastically affects your health. 2 major points...cost of healthcare is insane, and paying $500+ on food is a car payment which is a lot for families which children in central and southern U.S. Often highly processed food is pretty cheap in which you are able to buy higher quantities of but is not so good for your long term health.

I hear this argument continuously, but it does not convince me. You imply that McDonalds is bad. Why is it so? Mostly because it's very calorie dense, not because it's actually bad for you. In that respect, McD does its job very well, too well even, but it's not the food itself that is bad, its over consumption.

How bad are ramen for you anyway? Consuming it as a large part of your diet, within your caloric intake and getting the rest of your needed vitamins from different sources (fruits, supplements even), would you get sick with time? Why are certain foods labeled as "bad" automatically? t seems this gets repeated Ad nauseam but most always, the accusation is unsubstantiated.

It is encouraging for me to see my opinion on this reflected in your comment, I find it very worrying that it is so common for people to seemingly blindly accept the popular narrative on this issue. (Well, I guess I find it worrying if people seem to blindly accept the popular narrative for any issue, really).

Are you trying the imply that eating a double bacon cheeseburger with a coke and fries is healthy for you?? I do agree with you on consumption, but when was the last time you heard of someone having health issues because they over ate on fresh fruits and vegetables? In my comment I was more referring to farm fresh compared to the highly processed food that is much cheaper.

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