Politics of Obesity

Aug 20, 2004

I was reminded of a great article in the NY Times that argued that the cause of obesity, meat consumption and other bad stuff: cheap corn.

The rules of classical economics just don't seem to operate very well on the farm. When prices fall, for example, it would make sense for farmers to cut back on production, shrinking the supply of food to drive up its price. But in reality, farmers do precisely the opposite, planting and harvesting more food to keep their total income from falling, a practice that of course depresses prices even further.