Try living for a week on $2 a day.
"That’s what my students and I do when I teach my class about international development. It helps them begin to understand the trade-offs that must be made when you have only very limited resources. More broadly, it was in the Peace Corps in Botswana that I learned to carry water on my head, and noticed how heavy the bucket was; and I learned to pound sorghum in to flour and felt the ache in my back. As a designer, I came to understand the importance of technologies that can transport water or grind grain."
-Amy Smith
This secret of social innovation caught my attention because of a doc**entary I watched called "Killer at Large: Why Obesity is America's Greatest Threat". A researcher at the University of Washington went into a supermarket with only $1 to spend on energy (food). What he found was that he could buy a lot more processed food than fresh food. Down the snack aisle he could buy 1200 calories with his $1. Down the drink aisle he could buy 875 calories of soda for $1. In produce? he could only afford 250 calories in carrots with $1. And in orange juice he could only afford 150 calories with $1.
The United States has become a society that will gladly pay less money for less nutritious food but weary of paying more money for foods which are nutritionally superior to processed foods.
Living in America with an income of $14 per week is a far greater challenge than one can imagine; but it is not impossible. Having a $14 weekly grocery budget is a challenge we can certainly answer if there is enough motivation!
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