Trickle down foodie-ism? Not so much. And another thing: Rich people eat like sh*t, too.
Restaurant News’ website Monkeydish posted a neat little item about a Packaged Facts study they touted as showing that people were “going gourmet despite the recession.” This would lend credence to food movement folks’ argument that once people taste the good stuff, they simply reorganize their spending around good food instead of all those other things they spend their money on. Until you read the fine print, that is:
Purchasers of gourmet food products may make some concessions to stay within budget…About 20% of consumers seek these high end products and over 30% are willing to pay more for them.
In other words: People who ALREADY buy fancy food—20 percent, which dovetails nicely with some of the charts describing income inequality in the U.S.—are still buying it. Another 10 percent of us are wiling to pay more for good food, too. (I do wonder if they’re describing a phenomenon of people agreeing that yes, if they were going to buy caviar, they would expect to pay high prices for it.)
Monkeydish also helpfully posted another fun, counterintuitive story: The wealthy are buying more fast food. (Useful to note: “Wealthy” is defined in the American Express study as people spending more than $7,000 a month on their credit cards.) Not only are the affluent spending more on luxury hotels, cruises, and business-class airfare in one month than I make in five, they’re doing it partly by economizing on food. And eating crap.
So, to sum up: Rich people eat like rich people, even when the economy tightens, but when it tightens TOO much, they economize on food, too.
