I am not independently wealthy, I work for a non-profit and I live in an expensive city, so I stick to a pretty strict food budget. I am in constant struggle with my frugal side that really wants to buy things as cheap as possible, and my eco- & ethical-conscious side that really wants to buy organic, sustainable, home-grown and humanely harvested products.
Unfortunately, the words “organic,” “sustainable,” “home-grown,” and “humane” and the like usually add a significant amount to the price tag. In fact, if I only bought items that fell into those categories I could easily double (if not triple) my food expenditures.
So what to do? I haven’t yet come up with a good answer. In a perfect world, I would have enough resources to spend on food that matches my consciousness to sustainability and ethical treatment of animals, but right now that just isn’t a reality for me. Yes, people do make it work when things are a priority, it just happens that I have other priorities that take precedence right now. Does that make me a bad person?