One Dollar A Day

How much money do you spend every day on food?

In the U.S., people spend an average of $10 per day on food. In developing countries, 2.7 billion people live on less than $2 a day, and 1.1 billion survive on under $1. [Source: thinkquest.org]

In my family of two adults and two children, we spend roughly $5.35 per day per person. The total includes 28 breakfast meals, 18 lunch meals, 28 dinner meals and approximately 50 snacks. My son buys lunch at school during the academic year, and my daughter’s lunch is included in the price of her preschool tuition. I did not add those amounts to our weekly total. My best estimate is that we spend $175.00 per week on food, a total that includes purchases from the grocery store and farmer’s market. I believe that we are under the U.S. average primarily because we don’t go out to eat very often; my husband and I take our lunches to work; we buy locally as often as possible. I anticipate that our food bill will increase significantly as our children get older.

In September 2008, a young married couple vowed to spend $1.00 per day (each) on food. Christopher and Kerri chronicled the month on their blog, http://onedollardietproject.wordpress.com. At the risk of spoiling the ending, I will say only that they were successful and did not cheat.

However, some interesting questions arose during the month.
• Would it be ok to eat “free” food (i.e. food provided at work conferences, samples at the grocery store, cookies from students) without subtracting the cost from their daily total?
• Why do people with the most food security have the most access to free food?
• How do the demographics of the areas in which we live help determine our food security?

What would you do if you were living on $1.00 a day? $2.00 a day?

Kate Kenny is the managing editor of Columban Mission magazine.