Food Prices Are Key to Eating Better

Perhaps getting more Americans to eat better is as simple as changing food prices by making healthy foods at the supermarket cheaper and unhealthful ones more pricey. Using a web-based virtual supermarket experiment, researchers in the Netherlands found that people purchased 9% more fruits and vegetables, 16% more whole grains, and 58% more unsweetened dairy products when subsidies made them less expensive.

The purchase of products made with refined grains dropped by 39%, and sales of processed dairy products like ice cream dropped 30%, when they were taxed to be more expensive than usual. Curiously, beverage and snack purchases in virtual shopping carts did not significantly change in response to pricing strategies.

It’s likely that governments would need to implement policies—like offering rebates for the purchase of fruits and veggies—to nudge supermarkets toward this style of food prices.

See also: Food Aesthetics Influence Eating Choices