Eating Economics

The capital letter "E" is being used extensively in the recent press. I would expect that key on the keyboard is taking on that overused sheen on many laptops. Many times E's used for the words Economics or Energy or Earth or Environment, but I'm wondering about a 4th use that seems to be related to the other three...

Eating.

Times are tough in many western societies, largely based on poor energy decisions, in turn based on economic factors and having environmental repercussions. A recent question I'm thinking on with my spare cycles is this: Using the society with the largest recent economic impact as the context, has the diet of Americans changed to match the economic factors? The obvious answer is yes, but I would like to take it a bit further and explore the change.

Based on these US conditions, which US company would you prefer stock in:
A supplier of low cost budget-friendly food like McDonalds?
OR
A supplier of healthy foods like packaged salads from Fresh Express?

Again, we're talking about society at large as a single context, as it's understood that society strata make different economic decisions regardless of the overall class-independent economic environment.

Therefore, can we satisfactorially expect that possibly the dour mood draped on the states has people looking for hope, and therefore eating more healthy to prolong life, and give themselves something to feel better about? Critic: long shot...think comfort food instead.

Could they be eating out less often (even if fast food can be so labelled) to instead purchase food at the grocery, for economic reasons? Critic: Grocery stores don't just sell fresh, whole, healthy foods. Aisle 11 is stock-a-block with frozen Hungry Jack TV dinners.

Could they be catching on to the "organic" movement and trying to eat better foods? For those still stuck on the notion that the masses are different from those that can afford the choice, a factoid for you: WalMart, bastion of the economically limited, now sells more Organic food than non-organic, and is the largest retailer of Organically labelled food in the US.

So, in the Salad (Fresh Express) versus Big Mac (McD) matchup, which stock are you buying? I may just put some money into both, and track it.

Does eating green tie to feeling green tie to saving green? Does the spinach/environmental/economic combo beat out the red haired clown with greasy, burger-stained gloves in the other corner?