“Not everyone can afford to eat well”: this has been the rebuttal to health-food-enthusiasts in general (and locavores in particular) ever since the rise of writers like Michael Pollan. The argument goes that it costs more to buy healthy produce than a Big Mac. In the past, economists have compared the prices of these foods by the amount of calories they offer. Recently, however, the FDA conducted a study comparing food costs not only calorically, but also by price per edible weight and price per average amount eaten. The results? According to the latter two methods, “grains, vegetables, fruits, and dairy foods are less expensive than most protein foods and less healthy foods.”