How much money will vegetarians save?

Answer 1

At the moment there is not a general figure for how much the standard vegetarian saves on food bills, compared to a non-vegetarian person.

Personally, I'm not convinced there will be a huge difference in food bills either way: assuming both the "vegetarian" and the "non-vegetarian" are living on the same income, a similar proportion of that income is likely to be spent on food (standard economics). In the UK, grocery bills tend to be 1/4 of total income, regardless of how big or how little that income may be. (I.e as your income increases you buy more or better quality groceries). In France it's about 1/3 of income. But this indicates that food bills are more a function of income, than on dietary habits such as vegetarianism.

The above does not mean that both grocery bills are filled with similar status goods, even if the persons are on the same income - it may mean that one person's shop is only basics (if they need a lot of shopping), whereas the other can afford to buy luxuries (maybe if they only need a little shopping). Neither the less, the "total expenditure" will be similar for those on similar incomes.

This is because, although it does seem intuitive that the vegetarian should be spending less because they are not eating meat, this is not necessarily the case, since they will need to purchase other foods to fill the "space" in their diet where meat would usually be.

Also, high protein foods tend to fill a person up faster than lower protein foods. Although some vegetarian foods are high protein, the vast majority of high protein foods are meats. This may mean that the typical vegetarian has to eat more to feel the same level of "fullness" as a non-vegetarian.

You may have also noticed, but finding cheap vegetarian food (except from legumes) can be quite difficult. Most cheap ready-meals (although I'm not suggesting they're palatable) are not designed with the vegetarian in mind; non-vegetarians generally have more options when it comes to ready-meals, particularly the cheaper ready-meals. And if a non-vegetarian actually enjoys eating them, their food bills are likely to be cheaper than the vegetarian.

The average vegetarian is likely to spend more on fruit and veg than the average non-vegetarian, but as a consequence of this, the vegetarian may end up "losing" slightly more money on wastage (e.g if something expires before it can be eaten).

I'm sure you could find a vegetarian with a tiny food bill, along with a non-vegetarian on a similar income but with a much greater food bill. However, I do think that any differences in cost analysed over a large sample of vegetarians and non-vegetarians will yield very few cost differences.

However, if you're asking "how much does it save the economy by being vegetarian" (i.e growing crops rather than growing cows), that's not my area of expertise, so you may want to reword the question and submit it again to answers.com.