In his essay “The Rich Get Thinner, the Poor Get Fatter,” Warwick Sabin claims unhealthy food such as candy bars, soft drinks, and fast food are cheaper than healthy foods. Most Southern states have obesity rates around the thirty-percent mark. An article in the Chattanooga Times Free Press states “Southern culture plays a role in the rising obesity rates” (102). First, Southern foods such as fried chicken, pork ribs, biscuits and gravy, fried green tomatoes, and fried okra are all contributing foods to becoming obesity.
Another reason for obesity Sabin adds “as our lives become less physically demanding and our diets become less wholesome, all Americans are at risk of becoming in the obesity trap” (102). Second, at a grocery store fresh fruits, vegetables, and meats are more expensive than mass-produced processed foods. Poor use to mean you were really thin, and now it means you are dangerously fat. Poor people are going to buy unhealthy foods simply because they can’t afford to buy the more expensive healthier foods. Sabin notes “they are opting for the affordable calories” (102).
Rich people are going to be thinner because they have the money to buy the healthier expensive foods. Sabin also acknowledges “the fresh, local produce once available cheaply at the back-road farm stand has become the preserve of the elites, available in gourmet-food shops at inflated prices” (103). Finally, farming is still a main industry and yet it’s still out of reach for the Southerners. Schoolchildren are surrounded by fields and chicken houses, but they are eating processed lunches delivered by trucks from places nowhere close to them.
