59° THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 
WHEN DOES A FOOD BECOME A LUXURY? 
By Proressog HE. H. 8S. BAILHY 
UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS 
ie the rapid expansion which is taking place in this country, and in 
attempting to adjust ourselves to these changed conditions, and 
to the higher price of foodstuffs, there is danger that we forget to 
differentiate as carefully as we formerly did, between a nutritious food, 
which is purchased for its food value, and other products, also good 
enough as foods, but which are sold at prices which bring them within 
the domain of luxuries. 
In buying delicately flavored candies or chocolates at from 40 to 
80 cents per pound, although it is recognized, by those who think about 
it, that the chocolate and sugar are excellent food material, no one buys 
such things as food. They are purchased as luxuries pure and simple, 
because their flavor pleases the palate. Chocolate and sugar are also 
sold as food, or to be used as a constituent of foods, at a price so low 
that they can properly be used in the preparation of foods and bever- 
ages. In this case their food value is more closely proportionate to 
their cost. 
Although a definition is in some cases a stumbling block, we ven- 
ture to say that, in case of foods, a luxury is a substance that may have 
some nutritive value, but which has a low food value in proportion to 
the cost while, on the other hand, a food has, or should have, a compara- 
tively high food value in proportion to its cost. 
Some foods are expensive on account of their rarity or because 
they are out of season, some because of the cost of the original material 
from which they are made, some because they are brought from such a 
distance that the transportation charges are high, and others on ac- 
count of the expense attending the manufacture. 
In general, manufactured foods cost more than those upon which 
but little labor has been bestowed to prepare them for market. This 
is well illustrated in the case of ordinary granulated sugar which fre- 
quently retails at five cents per pound, while (although often made from 
the same “ stock”) “ cube” sugar, which has been sawn into blocks, and 
“ powdered” sugar, which has been ground and perhaps bolted, sells 
at ten cents per pound. The original materials in a five-cent loaf of 
bread would probably not cost three cents, yet we recognize that to 
make the bread and bake it and deliver it to the consumer costs some- 
