Book: On A Dollar A Day

I recently finished On A Dollar A Day, a book by Kerri Leonard and Christopher Greenslate, two teachers in California who embarked on a journey to live like the majority of people in the world. They decided for a month they would live on a $1 a day food budget per person. Their experiment was eye-opening and led the way to two other food related projects: one to sustain themselves on the monthly allowance for those receiving food stamp benefits in the U.S. and the other to eat healthfully while keeping their budget in check.

At first I thought I picked up a book on frugality, one of my favourite subjects and then I realized it was a book about another of my pet projects, studying the state of our current food system and all it's failures.



This book is packed with great insight and thought provoking conundrums. It asks questions pertaining to the poor, their ability to access good, wholesome food and how this relates to other food issues like obesity. As full time teachers, they struggle with making even simple meals from scratch but only because they are counting every penny.

I remember the days when the food dollars never seemed to stretch as far as they should and I remember the lethargic, hazy feeling that coincides with extended periods of hunger. In this book they talk about their minds not functioning optimally. Their tempers flare and the stress mounts. This is the reality for many in our world.

While moving into the Food Stamp experiment (they calculated the average amount of dollar value given in food stamps for a childless couple and used their own funds for this experiment) they thought going from $1 a day to nearly $4.13 was going to be fair bit better. However the increase in available funds did little to provide wholesome meals and they struggled with this experiment as well.

I don't believe there could be a better couple to have written this book. Alternating chapters, Christopher and Kerri reveal their experience with whit, wisdom and passion. It was an very enjoyable read and reminded me of the many people living in North America who still do not have enough to eat.

Now, I am reading The Moneyless Man, written by Marc Boyle who ventures to live a whole year without using money for ANYTHING. I think he's nuts but I'm only two chapters in so I will let you know once I am finished.