An Economic Analysis of Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Consumption: Implications for Overweight and Obesity among Higher- and Lower-Income Consumers

Higher- and lower-income consumers are shown to have the same price sensitivity (-.94)
for salad vegetables, but descriptive statistics of Table 2 show lower-income consumers paying
prices that are statistically lower than those paid by higher-income consumers ($1.51 vs $1.33).
A similar pattern is shown for major vegetables. No statistical difference is shown in the own-
price elasticities of higher- and lower-income consumers, but lower-income consumers pay a
much lower price ($1.13 vs $1.61). These price differences show considerable selectivity in
purchase selections because lower-income consumers purchase a much higher percentage of
their total produce within this sub-category (34.5% vs 22.3%). Indeed large purchases of major
vegetables by lower-income consumers are what account for the disparity in overall fruit and
vegetable purchases for this group (58.8% vegetables vs 41.2% fruit). The fact that lower-
income consumers have own-price elasticities comparable to those of higher-income consumers
and yet pay much lower prices would suggest that the two groups actually purchase entirely
different bundles of commodities.

The own-price elasticity for Chinese vegetables is highly inelastic (-.43), but statistically
identical for both income groups. Identical elasticities for the second highest-priced sub-
category of vegetables are difficult to justify theoretically, but given the mix of vegetables within
this category, it is likely that consumers further segment this sub-category. That is, price
changes that influence the purchases of one group might be entirely irrelevant to another group.
Such scenario could explain how identical price elasticities for Chinese vegetables would result
in lower-income consumers paying an average of $1.04 less per pound for Chinese vegetables
(Table 2).

Lower-income consumers are shown to have larger own-price elasticities than higher-
income consumers for yellow vegetables and these differences are statistically significant (-1.66

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