In recent years I've become the sort of person that is more likely to ask why something is so cheap rather than why it is so expensive. I realize that asking this question is something I can do in part because of privilege. I am in a position to be able to afford to look at the labels when I shop, eat the occasional meal out, and on that basis somebody might consider me elitist or a snob to suggest that food, on the whole, is priced artificially low. 

That's why I felt it was time to lay out, as briefly as possible, a philosophy on the cost of food.