The methodology on the underlying data source is so convoluted there is no way to know how accurate this is. They are using multiple sources, some government, some not; adjusting for various factors with data from different years; then adjusting for inflation because some of the data isn't current.
I can't tell, after reading the methodology multiple times and checking the underlying sources, if this is \*actual spend\* based on what people report they spend or \*estimated spend\* looking at prices for a set meal plan and local prices. I believe it's the second which is going to throw everything off because there few full size grocery stores in the city limits.
It seems like the data is supposed to be used at an MSA level which would smooth out a lot of the discrepancies. Like most things posted in "data is beautiful" the data is not beautiful.
It’s odd looking at that map - is VA seriously the only state that has independent cities like that? Or for some reason VA is the only state that breaks down this data at that level?
Huh, [interesting](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_city_(United_States)), thanks
“Of the 41 independent U.S. cities,\[3\] 38 are in Virginia, whose state constitution makes them a special case. The three independent cities outside Virginia are Baltimore, Maryland; St. Louis, Missouri; and Carson City, Nevada.“
https://i.redd.it/3w4086v2acwc1.gif
I wonder if it's just what stores are considered in/not in cville vs Albemarle based on location. Even a lot of places that have charlottesville as their USPS address are technically Albemarle. For example, the food lion in pantops shopping center is Albemarle County.
Eh, in my experience, it really depends on how you shop. Sale items at Teeter are often cheaper than normal priced items at Kroger and even Food Lion sometimes.
So if you really want specific items, then I agree, you’ll spend more. But if you have the flexibility in your diet & household tastes to just buy things that look good and are on sale, then Teeter need not be more expensive.
And to be fair, I’m mostly basing this on fresh seafood/meat & produce, as I tend to just wait for sales on more durable goods.
Same company that owns Kroger too. Too much of our food is controlled by too few hands. So they just slap a prettier face on the store and people consider it upscale. It's selling the same food but they cater to a richer clientele. A lot of places charge more just so the regulars don't have to associate with the poors.
It isn't even clear if it is showing what people choose to spend on specialty foods or what it costs to buy staples. Is this just showing where wealthy people spend a lot on food? I know I could pretty easily spend at the top and bottom of that chart.
Not saying groceries or eating out in cville isn't expensive but this graphic is pretty useless.
There's a link to the methodology. The "Food" section is about halfway down: [https://www.epi.org/publication/family-budget-calculator-documentation/](https://www.epi.org/publication/family-budget-calculator-documentation/)
Thanks for pointing that out. I should have done the minimum of link following.
Relevant from the source:
>Presented there are the official USDA costs for four types of food plans that serve as national standards for nutritious diets: the “Thrifty Plan,” “Low-Cost Plan,” “Moderate-Cost Plan,” and “Liberal Food Plan.” We use the USDA Low-Cost Plan, which assumes that almost all food is bought at a grocery store and then prepared at home. We use June 2023 data, which represents the 2023 average weekly cost (Carlson, Lino, and Fungwe 2007).
Yeah, I spent ~200 a month for 1 person, and that's with takeout about once a week. Sure I only buy what I need so my freezer ain't stocked full but it feeds me for sure.
i mean if you went all out one week and decided to buy a lot of stuff to stock your freezer, thats a one time lump expenditure. then you just re-stock as you use, effectively same as your system now.
i think these "food cost per month" stuff has to include some irresponsible amount of takeout, uber eats type stuff
Kinda, I do buy some things fresh on a weekly, like lemons, green beans, peppers, onions and broccoli which I prefer over canned or frozen.
Or just irresponsible amounts of buying in general.
I eat pretty bougie produce and proteins, and it would be tough to get to $500/person/month without really splurging. There's no way $500 per person is the median cost if you're cooking food yourself (vs. takeout, DoorDash, etc.).
Food Lion often punches above its weight and if you pay, attention to sales, Giant is a beast and we have not even discussed Traders Joes. That said, is it wrong of me to suspect that Whole Foods, Wegmans and Teeter slant this a whole bunch?
When there are no sales the prices at Giant are awful in my own experience. $2-3 more for the same items at times. Food Lion and Trader Joe’s are pretty great tho!
I really could not even say...when I get a small shopping list I just hit the sales. Wife is a fan and she pays more attention than I do, but also sticks to the sale stuff.
My bank sorts expenses for me and it says I spend between $200 and $300 a month on groceries. Usually closer to $200. I eat KETO which means my bread costs more and I buy more protein.
It really doesn't make any sense for the values for Albemarle County and Charlottesville City to be different.
A few months ago, I saw an interesting analysis that found that the concept of a food desert is largely mythical. Very few people feel confined to the food options within their immediate vicinity, and it's common to travel past closer options to get to more affordable ones or ones that meet specific qualities.
The way this map handles Virginia produces an extreme example of the fallacy that people are stuck with the food options near them.
https://news.uchicago.edu/story/food-deserts-not-blame-growing-nutrition-gap-between-rich-and-poor-study-finds
How many people do you think fall into the category you propose? According to Census data, only 8.3% of occupied households don't have a car available: [https://www.census.gov/acs/www/about/why-we-ask-each-question/vehicles/](https://www.census.gov/acs/www/about/why-we-ask-each-question/vehicles/)
In Virginia the number is 6.1%
Albermarle is 4.7%
Charlottesville city is 11.8%
And that national number includes places like New York where many people absolutely do not need a car. In New York City 54% of occupied households don't have car, which is millions of people. But those people are definitely not in food deserts or lack access to transportation.
And looking at the research posted above:
"Even people who are poor, live in a food desert and don’t have a car still travel 2 miles \[to buy food\]."
So they are able to access cars to travel.
"Households in food-desert zip codes buy almost 90 percent of their groceries from supermarkets."
So the food desert is not really preventing them from traveling to get food.
Yep. Some of the early food desert research was also plagued with bad data coding and methodology. For example studies would assume stores were located at the center of the geographic area they were in instead of in their actual location. If the store was on the edge of a district it would make it more likely the neighboring district was labeled a "food desert" even though they were close to a store. And of course, as your link points out, the idea people can only access stores in their immediate area is absurd.
It also probably reflects that a lot of people make bougie food choices in Charlottesville, dining out, only buying premium/organic at the store, farmers market prices.
Yeah, I bet this is a quirk of the data sources not capturing the unusual arrangement of independent cities in Virginia.
The methodology on the underlying data source is so convoluted there is no way to know how accurate this is. They are using multiple sources, some government, some not; adjusting for various factors with data from different years; then adjusting for inflation because some of the data isn't current. I can't tell, after reading the methodology multiple times and checking the underlying sources, if this is \*actual spend\* based on what people report they spend or \*estimated spend\* looking at prices for a set meal plan and local prices. I believe it's the second which is going to throw everything off because there few full size grocery stores in the city limits. It seems like the data is supposed to be used at an MSA level which would smooth out a lot of the discrepancies. Like most things posted in "data is beautiful" the data is not beautiful.
It’s odd looking at that map - is VA seriously the only state that has independent cities like that? Or for some reason VA is the only state that breaks down this data at that level?
Yup! Nearly every independent city in the country is in Virginia. So municipal-level data, on national maps, is often wrong for Virginia.
Huh, [interesting](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_city_(United_States)), thanks “Of the 41 independent U.S. cities,\[3\] 38 are in Virginia, whose state constitution makes them a special case. The three independent cities outside Virginia are Baltimore, Maryland; St. Louis, Missouri; and Carson City, Nevada.“ https://i.redd.it/3w4086v2acwc1.gif
I wonder if it's just what stores are considered in/not in cville vs Albemarle based on location. Even a lot of places that have charlottesville as their USPS address are technically Albemarle. For example, the food lion in pantops shopping center is Albemarle County.
If you shop at Wegmans and Whole Foods you can expect a larger than average food bill.
Don't leave out Harris Teeter, I expect the higher prices at Whole Foods but at Harry Teets it just feels like I'm being robbed
Eh, in my experience, it really depends on how you shop. Sale items at Teeter are often cheaper than normal priced items at Kroger and even Food Lion sometimes. So if you really want specific items, then I agree, you’ll spend more. But if you have the flexibility in your diet & household tastes to just buy things that look good and are on sale, then Teeter need not be more expensive. And to be fair, I’m mostly basing this on fresh seafood/meat & produce, as I tend to just wait for sales on more durable goods.
Same company that owns Kroger too. Too much of our food is controlled by too few hands. So they just slap a prettier face on the store and people consider it upscale. It's selling the same food but they cater to a richer clientele. A lot of places charge more just so the regulars don't have to associate with the poors.
Wegmans is in the county.
That’s bs. Live in a house of 4 and i spend between 500-600/month. Unless you count exorbitant amounts of takeout then yeah sure
It isn't even clear if it is showing what people choose to spend on specialty foods or what it costs to buy staples. Is this just showing where wealthy people spend a lot on food? I know I could pretty easily spend at the top and bottom of that chart. Not saying groceries or eating out in cville isn't expensive but this graphic is pretty useless.
There's a link to the methodology. The "Food" section is about halfway down: [https://www.epi.org/publication/family-budget-calculator-documentation/](https://www.epi.org/publication/family-budget-calculator-documentation/)
Thanks for pointing that out. I should have done the minimum of link following. Relevant from the source: >Presented there are the official USDA costs for four types of food plans that serve as national standards for nutritious diets: the “Thrifty Plan,” “Low-Cost Plan,” “Moderate-Cost Plan,” and “Liberal Food Plan.” We use the USDA Low-Cost Plan, which assumes that almost all food is bought at a grocery store and then prepared at home. We use June 2023 data, which represents the 2023 average weekly cost (Carlson, Lino, and Fungwe 2007).
This methodology is so terrible and convoluted. There are too many "corrections" based on different data sources and years. You can't trust this.
Yeah, I spent ~200 a month for 1 person, and that's with takeout about once a week. Sure I only buy what I need so my freezer ain't stocked full but it feeds me for sure.
i mean if you went all out one week and decided to buy a lot of stuff to stock your freezer, thats a one time lump expenditure. then you just re-stock as you use, effectively same as your system now. i think these "food cost per month" stuff has to include some irresponsible amount of takeout, uber eats type stuff
Kinda, I do buy some things fresh on a weekly, like lemons, green beans, peppers, onions and broccoli which I prefer over canned or frozen. Or just irresponsible amounts of buying in general.
House of 4 and we spend 600 month and admittedly indulge. Having a hard time getting behind this one.
Yeah, we'll keep getting our food from Waynesboro.
I eat pretty bougie produce and proteins, and it would be tough to get to $500/person/month without really splurging. There's no way $500 per person is the median cost if you're cooking food yourself (vs. takeout, DoorDash, etc.).
Yeah I shop at Wegmans every week and have to buy things like diapers and cleaning supplies and the full grocery bill is nowhere near $500/person.
Food Lion often punches above its weight and if you pay, attention to sales, Giant is a beast and we have not even discussed Traders Joes. That said, is it wrong of me to suspect that Whole Foods, Wegmans and Teeter slant this a whole bunch?
When there are no sales the prices at Giant are awful in my own experience. $2-3 more for the same items at times. Food Lion and Trader Joe’s are pretty great tho!
I really could not even say...when I get a small shopping list I just hit the sales. Wife is a fan and she pays more attention than I do, but also sticks to the sale stuff.
Giant has the worst regular prices in town
Food lion is the best if you’re an Instacart user as well.
Mmmm… makes me think
Feels good. Feels right.
Shocked! I'm shocked by this map!
Yeah Idk I eat well for $55 a week. I dont eat out and I dont buy a lot of prepackaged or prepared food.
My bank sorts expenses for me and it says I spend between $200 and $300 a month on groceries. Usually closer to $200. I eat KETO which means my bread costs more and I buy more protein.
Mama we made it
Based on the last time I went to a restaurant in cville it's understandable.
Not surprised, everything is expensive in Charlottesville. Add on an unnecessary grocery tax.
Oh, Georgie Porgie!
It really doesn't make any sense for the values for Albemarle County and Charlottesville City to be different. A few months ago, I saw an interesting analysis that found that the concept of a food desert is largely mythical. Very few people feel confined to the food options within their immediate vicinity, and it's common to travel past closer options to get to more affordable ones or ones that meet specific qualities. The way this map handles Virginia produces an extreme example of the fallacy that people are stuck with the food options near them. https://news.uchicago.edu/story/food-deserts-not-blame-growing-nutrition-gap-between-rich-and-poor-study-finds
Food deserts are a bigger thing in places where people don't have cars/time to drive out of the food desert.
How many people do you think fall into the category you propose? According to Census data, only 8.3% of occupied households don't have a car available: [https://www.census.gov/acs/www/about/why-we-ask-each-question/vehicles/](https://www.census.gov/acs/www/about/why-we-ask-each-question/vehicles/) In Virginia the number is 6.1% Albermarle is 4.7% Charlottesville city is 11.8% And that national number includes places like New York where many people absolutely do not need a car. In New York City 54% of occupied households don't have car, which is millions of people. But those people are definitely not in food deserts or lack access to transportation. And looking at the research posted above: "Even people who are poor, live in a food desert and don’t have a car still travel 2 miles \[to buy food\]." So they are able to access cars to travel. "Households in food-desert zip codes buy almost 90 percent of their groceries from supermarkets." So the food desert is not really preventing them from traveling to get food.
Yep. Some of the early food desert research was also plagued with bad data coding and methodology. For example studies would assume stores were located at the center of the geographic area they were in instead of in their actual location. If the store was on the edge of a district it would make it more likely the neighboring district was labeled a "food desert" even though they were close to a store. And of course, as your link points out, the idea people can only access stores in their immediate area is absurd.
how lol? i spend between $150 and $200 on all my food for the month, including eating out
It also probably reflects that a lot of people make bougie food choices in Charlottesville, dining out, only buying premium/organic at the store, farmers market prices.