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Using the Thrifty Food Plan to Assess the Cost of a Nutritious Diet
Author(s) -
WILDE PARKE E.,
LLOBRERA JOSEPH
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
journal of consumer affairs
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.582
H-Index - 62
eISSN - 1745-6606
pISSN - 0022-0078
DOI - 10.1111/j.1745-6606.2009.01140.x
Subject(s) - consumption (sociology) , government (linguistics) , plan (archaeology) , economics , agricultural economics , environmental health , business , food science , public economics , medicine , biology , paleontology , social science , linguistics , philosophy , sociology
The federal government's Thrifty Food Plan (TFP) minimizes the difference between a proposed food plan and a current consumption bundle, subject to cost and nutrition constraints. This article adapted the TFP framework to estimate the cost of a nutritious diet, distinguishing between nutrition constraints based on food categories (meat, vegetables) or nutrients (saturated fat, calcium). The official cost target for the TFP was sufficient if one tolerated a very high difference from current consumption patterns, or if one used nutrition standards instead of MyPyramid food category standards. In other scenarios, with different constraints, the official cost target was insufficient.