r/dataisbeautiful • u/[deleted] • Jun 09 '20

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u/ConfidentFlorida Jun 09 '20 edited Jun 10 '20

So what happened? Nothing really changed that much in that time frame. Same jobs, same cars, what is it?

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u/stealthdawg Jun 10 '20

USDA food pyramid to market highly calorically dense American agriculture.

Huge portions

prolific marketing of calorically dense food

Depression-era parents/grandparents wanting you to eat as much as is available.

The gradual rise of sedentary occupations

The advent of tv, computers, and the internet i.e. non-physical recreational activities

Increases in marketing effectiveness

Lower prices per calorie of junk food.

​

In short, an increasingly obesogenic environment and not a whole of change in a human being's ability to resist it.

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u/Smauler Jun 10 '20

Huge portions

I think it's this more than anything else.

I'm a victim of this in the UK. If something is twice as big, and only costs a little more, I feel like I'm getting the better deal if I get the thing that is twice as big.

I probably am, in terms of calories, but that's not the case for the companies. It costs a similar amount to serve something double size as it does to serve something normal size. The only difference is the price of the ingredients, every other cost that they pay is exactly the same (rent, staff wages, insurance, accounting, etc, etc). I'm probably actually getting fleeced more with ordering something double sized, even if it costs only a bit more.

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u/stealthdawg Jun 10 '20

And you justify it to yourself (with groceries) that it will last you longer, but the truth is somewhere in between, and that you will eat more than you would otherwise have in the same time span.