"The History of every major Galactic Civilization tends to pass through three distinct and recognizable phases, those of Survival, Inquiry and Sophistication, otherwise known as the How, Why, and Where phases. For instance, the first phase is characterized by the question 'How can we eat?' the second by the question 'Why do we eat?' and the third by the question 'Where shall we have lunch?" - Douglas Adams

Folks on HN are very much in the "Where" stage of life. No one here works 4 out of 8 hours just to pay for their food. Nobody should.

That said, you very much seem to be missing the point. Ultra processed food is far, far cheaper than whole foods. That is one reason they are more popular.

For example, it would cost me more just to buy the ingredients to make tacos at home than it does to go through a Taco Bell drive through and buy enough for the family already prepared.

We're not going to be moving to four hour workdays by feeding people food that costs twice as much and takes longer to prepare.

My brother and his wife began cooking pretty much every meal at home a couple years ago. Prior to that they ate out very regularly, especially once they had kids.

They started cooking because feeding the family of 5 at McDonalds cost close to $80.

There may have been a time where fast food was cheaper, but it seems we're past that.

As far as Taco Bell goes, a single crunchy taco is $2.19 and their fancier ones are closer to $5. When I used to eat there I'd usually get 3 tacos and a drink, so I'd be into that today for something like $10-$11. I cook tacos at home regularly for cheaper, and with homemade tortillas and grass fed beef no less.

> They started cooking because feeding the family of 5 at McDonalds cost close to $80.

How much would they eat from McDonald’s? And what size appetite are the kids?

Fast food has definitely gone up in price, but if you’re spending $80 at McDonalds you’re either a glutton or you don’t know what to order.

A “Big Mac Bundle Box” is $15-20 depending on region. It has two Big Macs, two Cheeseburgers, two fries, and a 10-piece nuggets.

If three of the five are kids (vs say 16+ boys lifting weights), I’d be curious how two of those wouldn’t feed the entire family for $30-40.

I’m not suggesting cooking at home is a bad thing nor that eating McD is a good one. But the details matter when you’re spending 2x more than it could be.

Oh I'm sure some of the cost is because both my brother and their teenage son can eat some food. They're both in good shape, they just exercise quite a bit and have always had an appetite.

I also thought $80 for 5 was high, but that was his anecdotal number. I would have expected $50-60 pretty reasonably, and still st that point a family of 5 could eat for a good bit cheaper at home.

You are right, I stand corrected. It's been about 10 years since I last did the math and it's changed dramatically since then.

I'm sure it varies by region, but my grubhub app and the 12 pack of tacos (hard or soft) is $24.99 here so about the same as the $2.19 you found.

I had perplexity pro figure out the cost of purchasing the ingredients for comparable homemade tacos. With great value (Walmart store brand) ingredients it came to $20.04. $6.49 of that would be "left over" ingredients you don't use (mostly half a pound of beef you could use for something else later).

So you save $0.96 cents per taco by doing all the work yourself and using generic ingredients. Plus you get an extra half pound of beef for later.

So if your time is worth less than $12/hr it's a net gain.

I'm assuming it takes you only half an hour to travel, shop, and bring home the ingredients then half an hour to cook. If you live further away, factor in gas etc, the time it takes to do dishes, or are a slower cook then the break-even might come out closer to $6-$7/hr.

When we make tacos it takes around 30-45 minutes, including making fresh flour tortillas.

Tortillas themselves use very little, a cup of flour and a couple tablespoons of butter so maybe $1-$2? The beef we use is around $12/lb and we use 1/2lb to feed two of us. I don't have a cost on the seasoning, we mix it fresh as well so its negligible.

I'd assume we end up around $10 to feed two adults and spend around 45 minutes on the high end. We'd spend about that long to get to taco bell, though we live in a more rural area so that may be an over estimate for most.

> Ultra processed food is far, far cheaper than whole foods.

I think this is mostly true in the US and a cultural thing.

In EU and SA for example I can buy “whole” food - just called food here - for a fraction of the price it would cost me to buy a bunch of cheeseburgers or some other junk food every day.

It isn't remotely true even in the US, anyone claiming this doesn't know how to cook anything.

>> Ultra processed food is far, far cheaper than whole foods

Is it? What is the cost of bag of rice? Potatoes? lentils?

Anyone who believes something like this you can be 100% sure doesn't know how to cook even the most basic of staple foods. Cooking your own food is nearly an order of magnitude cheaper and, with a few cheap spices and seasonings, almost always tastier. The only valid argument is prep time here, and that too even only applies to certain kinds of foods.