RE: Simple day, simple food

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beelzael in Reflections • 11 days ago

What was a common daily wage for a industry worker or something like that back in those days? That comparison is always the interesting one. How many hit potatoes can I eat from my salary?

I love living in Ecuador for the cheap and good veggies. Plenty of options, some organically grown on purpose and more expensive, but most in little backyard gardens, without any money to buy chemicals, just compost and Chili based insecticide and other traditional garden helpers. All that sold on Sunday on the indigenous market. Amongst the "regular" veggies, but it's fairly easy to spot what's what. I spent 80$ a month on food, 100$ if I eat out a couple of times.

11 days ago in Reflections by beelzael

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urrirru 10 days ago

In 1850, the average worker received 20 shillings a week or 240 pennies. Women received half as much. A worker received 960 pennies a month and could buy 1,920 baked potatoes on the street, 250-300 grams each, with his salary. I think raw potatoes were 3 times cheaper and a worker could buy 1,900 kilograms of potatoes. This is quite a lot, now in my country 1 kg of potatoes costs 0.5 - 0.7 $, but the salary in the province is about 400-500 $. Although a worker could buy more potatoes at that time, their housing was very expensive and many lived in cramped houses, clothes were also more expensive.

You have very low food expenses and quality vegetables. My own vegetables are enough for only half a year and I buy vegetables in the supermarket (of course they are worse than vegetables from my garden). For a family of 4, I try not to buy food daily for more than $ 10, but it is difficult. I spend $ 300-400 on food in the fall and spring, when I am in a big city.

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beelzael 10 days ago

Potatoes are cheap and good here, too. Last year, we had a scarcity, leading to prices around 30-35$ for 50kg bags of the big potatoes, the ones used for fries. Like that 300g beast you have in the picture. So everyone planted potatoes, and as a consequence, those same bags were around 8$. But not organic at all.

I accidentally grew a couple of potatoes with my tomatoes in the pots on the balcony... They had apparently fallen into the dirt I was using :-D I hope the compost has enough nutrients for both plants.

The official salary here is $470 plus benefits (social security & health insurance), but most workers are unofficial and make less. I know of some "better" restaurants paying their workers $1,25-1,50 per hour while charging high food prices. It's a small town, and in the rural areas it's worse. Still, they can make a lot of potatoes with that.

The idea of baked potatoes as street food is great, too. Here, everything is deep fried or super sweet or typical stuff like hot dogs and burgers. There is one exception - Cevichocho, a mix of Lupin Beans, tomato sauce, onions, cilantro. Plus tostado, roasted corn, and for those who like it a touch of chicken or pig skin. I love that (without the animal), and was a very regular customer when I still went to the market each day for the restaurant. Costs $0,50 for a little bag that doesn't fill you, but let's you hang in until the next wave of customers passed.

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