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01 / 05
Three Cheers for Refrigeration—and Four, Once Everyone Has It

Blog Post | Health & Medical Care

Three Cheers for Refrigeration—and Four, Once Everyone Has It

Refrigerators have revolutionized health and wellbeing for those with access to them, but their affordability is under fire.

Ben Lieberman —

Summary: Refrigeration has revolutionized public health and improved the quality of life worldwide, but its future is under threat. The remarkable benefits it brings, such as reducing foodborne illnesses and improving the quality of food, are being undermined by misguided climate change policies that increase costs. This article explains why it is crucial to prioritize the accessibility and affordability of refrigeration and reliable electricity, as they are such powerful keys to human progress.

It is difficult to overstate the benefits of refrigeration. Even more than its technological sibling air conditioning, refrigeration has dramatically improved public health and the quality of life wherever it has become widespread. And unlike air conditioning, the utility of which is questioned in some intellectual circles, refrigeration has few if any critics. Nonetheless, in an age when climate change has become the near obsession of most international policymakers—and given that refrigeration does require a considerable amount of (often) fossil-fuel fired electricity—it is worth highlighting the importance of avoiding measures that threaten its continued spread throughout the world.

The Rise of Refrigeration and Fall of Foodborne Illness

In 2013–2014, salmonella-contaminated chicken from Foster Farms in California caused a known 634 illnesses across 29 states. This major outbreak and recall received substantial press coverage at the time, as have similar ones that have happened. But before refrigeration, such incidents would not have been treated as news; they were an everyday reality.

Along with air conditioning, the United States was the first nation to have a refrigerator in most residences, as well as an extensive cold chain among food producers and wholesalers and retailers upstream of the consumer. Therefore, America provides the longest test case of the public health benefits from having a food supply that can be kept cold as needed. Those benefits are impressive.

It is over the last century that American households went from zero to nearly 100 percent in refrigerator use. Indeed, market penetration was already above 80 percent by the 1940s. Thanks to a fridge in every kitchen, and along with other major advances like pasteurization, food-related illness and mortality have seen a precipitous decline.

Even health outcomes not obviously connected to refrigeration have benefited from it. For example, there is considerable evidence that cancers of the stomach became considerably less common in the United States thanks to refrigerators.

Beyond reducing foodborne illness, refrigeration has also improved the quality of the food supply. This is particularly true for protein sources like dairy, meat, and fish that are quickly perishable without it. It has also enabled wider and year-round availability of fresh fruits and vegetables. These fresh (and also fresh frozen, as sizeable freezer sections have become a standard feature in refrigerators) foods have largely replaced heavily salted or smoked or pickled foods, and thus improved diets.

Lower income households have benefited the most from refrigeration. Not only has the cost of a high-quality diet come down, but the once-considerable expense of food spoilage has been reduced. This is particularly important for those who live in hotter regions.

Given all the health benefits of a safer and better food supply attributable to refrigeration, there is little doubt it has contributed to the considerably longer life expectancies in the United States over the past century. Granted, improved health care has been the main driver of these improvements, including vaccines against many once-common diseases. But even with that, refrigeration has played a vital role in the manufacture, transport, and storage of those vaccines as well as in many other medical applications.

Progress and Challenges toward Global Availability of Refrigeration

Refrigerators started as a luxury good a century ago, but prices have substantially declined since (although it should be noted that the recently growing regulatory burden on appliances in the United States and Europe may undercut this trend). Today, very few kitchens in the developed world are without a refrigerator, and market penetration in the developing world has been robust, particularly over the last three decades.

At this point, equipment cost is a barrier for only the world’s very poorest households. However, United Nations efforts favoring “climate-friendly” refrigerators represent a worrisome trend threatening affordability. For example, many existing refrigerators use refrigerants called hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) that are considered to have a high per-molecule global warming potential, though their overall contribution to anthropogenic warming is only 3 percent. These refrigerants are now subject to restrictions pursuant to the Kigali Amendment, a United Nations treaty.

Although the Kigali Amendment is more lenient toward developing nations than developed ones, it will nonetheless harm the developing world’s refrigerator buyers in two ways. First, the treaty and implementing provisions will serve to disrupt with the supply of second-hand refrigerators from first-world nations, which are often the lowest cost option in developing nations. In fact, the trade in such refrigerators is now perceived by many in the international community as an environmental threat that needs to be eradicated. Second, the Kigali Amendment will eventually impose restrictions on the types of new systems allowed to be produced in developing nations.

These measures are fairly new and are just beginning to be implemented, so the impact on equipment costs is not yet known. But they will likely raise, at least to some extent, the purchase price of a refrigerator. It does not take much of an increase to have a deleterious impact on market penetration among the world’s poorest households.

Access to Reliable Electricity

While refrigerator affordability is an ongoing concern, the greater obstacle is access to reliable electricity.

The slow march to a completely electrified world is 90 percent complete. We have finally reached the point where most of the developing world has joined the developed world in being electrified, but about 750 million people still don’t have it. Worse, by adding in those lacking access to reliable electricity, the number jumps to 3.5 billion, according to one estimate. In Africa, less than half the population enjoys access to reliable electricity.

An unreliable electricity supply can significantly undercut the advantages of refrigeration, as anyone who has had to clean out the fridge after an extended blackout can attest. More progress on both the availability and reliability of electricity is still needed if the benefits of refrigeration are to become universal.

Once again, the climate change agenda is becoming a growing impediment. Progress on electrification is jeopardized by the United Nations’ Paris Agreement and other measures that target affordable and reliable—but carbon-emitting—coal and natural gas in favor of intermittent and unreliable wind and solar. Doing so threatens to both slow progress in expanding electrification for those who don’t yet have it and to improve reliability for those who do.

Even in the first world where refrigeration has long been nearly universal, there are risks from mandates and subsidies for an increasingly renewables-heavy electricity mix chosen for climate considerations at the expense of reliability. If unchecked, this trend could lead to more frequent blackouts and, thus, backsliding on the refrigeration benefits people take for granted. This is especially so for the summer months when refrigeration is most vital.

Conclusion

Today, a large and growing number of the world’s households, both rich and poor, are able to buy a refrigerator, plug it in, and enjoy the benefits of its uninterrupted operation. This has been an indisputably significant boon to the safety and quality of the food supply and thus to public health. However, ill-advised climate change policy measures are emerging as a real threat to refrigeration’s continued spread. Prioritization of a climate agenda that raises the cost of a refrigerator is likely to do considerably more harm than good and deter the spread of affordable and reliable electricity throughout the world. Refrigeration has been a growing success story for humanity over the past century, but continued progress is now at risk.

Cornell SC Johnson College of Business | Food Consumption

GLP-1 Adoption Is Changing Consumer Food Demand

“We examine how consumers modify their food purchases after adopting appetite-suppressing GLP-1 receptor agonists, such as Ozempic and Wegovy. Using survey responses on medication adoption linked to transaction data from a representative U.S. household panel, we document the prevalence, motivations, and demographic patterns of GLP-1 adoption. Households with at least one GLP-1 user reduce grocery spending by 5.3% within six months of adoption, with higher-income households reducing spending by 8.2%. While most food categories see spending declines, the largest reductions are concentrated in calorie-dense, processed categories, including a 10.1% decline in savory snacks. In contrast, a small set of categories show directionally positive changes, with yogurt experiencing the only statistically significant increase. We also find an 8.0% decline in spending at fast-food chains, coffee shops, and limited-service restaurants. These food demand adjustments persist through the first year of medication use, though with some attenuation after six months.”

From Cornell SC Johnson College of Business.

Blog Post | Food Prices

McDonald’s Abundance Serves the World

The premier American brand has sold a trillion burgers.

Gale L. Pooley —

Summary: With plausibly up to a trillion burgers sold worldwide, McDonald’s has become one of the most recognizable symbols of abundance and convenience. Its cheeseburger now takes far less work time to afford than in the past, reflecting broad gains in prosperity. McDonald’s has grown into a cultural touchstone, serving communities across the globe.

In 1948, McDonald’s offered nine items on its menu. This helped simplify operations and lower costs. McDonald’s stopped officially counting its hamburger sales after surpassing 100 billion burgers in 1994. However, based on recent estimates of roughly 75 burgers sold every second—or approximately 2.36 billion per year—the total number of burgers sold by McDonald’s is likely in the hundreds of billions, with some sources suggesting McDonald’s has already sold its trillionth burger.

My favorite McDonald’s item is the cheeseburger. It’s been my top choice since 1973, when McDonald’s first came to my hometown. This product will provide you with 300 calories, 15 grams of protein, 31 grams of carbohydrates, 13 grams of fat, and 720 milligrams of sodium. I think it’s delicious and a great food value.

In 1948, entry-level workers were earning around 66 cents an hour. A 19 cent cheeseburger would cost them around 17.4 minutes. Today they’re $1.99 and entry-level food service workers are earning $18.67 an hour, putting the time price at 6.4 minutes. The time price has dropped by 63 percent: You get 2.7 cheeseburgers today for the time price of one in 1948.

Today, with over 41,800 stores in 118 countries and global sales of $130 billion, chances are, wherever you go in the world you can find the Golden Arches calling you. Approximately 93 percent of the restaurants are owned and operated by independent franchisees, which has made many of them millionaires.

Chris Arnade has written extensively about how important McDonald’s is to American culture. He has a PhD in physics from Johns Hopkins University and worked for 20 years as a trader at an elite Wall Street bank before leaving in 2012 to become a photojournalist. His writings include many beautiful photographs that reveal the central role McDonald’s plays in many communities. Please take a few minutes to enjoy his work here.

Writing this has made me hungry. Time to add to that trillion burger count.

Find more of Gale’s work at his Substack, Gale Winds.

Blog Post | Labor & Employment

From Muscle to Mind: Earn More with Fewer Calories and Fewer Deaths

Office workers use 77.8 percent less energy and experience a 95.3 percent lower fatality rate than construction workers.

Gale L. Pooley —

Summary: Work has changed dramatically over time, shifting significantly from physical to mental labor. Today, office jobs demand far less physical energy and carry far lower risks of injury or death compared to physically demanding trades. This transition shows how progress has allowed us to create more value with less strain on our bodies—and with far greater safety than workers of the past could have imagined.

Economist George Gilder points out that using blue-collar hourly wage rates to calculate time prices underestimates the gains we’re enjoying in an economy that’s no longer driven by muscle but by mind. Knowledge workers earn more in an hour, consume fewer calories, and risk far less death or injury than other workers. In other words, they do far more with far less. This is the true compounding of progress—and we can see it mapped on a single chart.

Calories Per Hour of Work

I asked several AI models about the number of calories per hour that different kinds of work require and this is what I got:

The energy demands of physical work versus knowledge work reveals a dramatic difference in caloric expenditure. Workers in physically demanding jobs burn significantly more calories than do their office counterparts:

High-energy physical work:

  • Construction tasks such as masonry or hanging sheetrock: 400–500 calories per hour (equivalent to running or high-intensity aerobics)
  • Heavy lifting and transport: 285–300 calories per hour for a 170-pound worker

Moderate physical work:

  • Manufacturing: 228 calories per hour (men), 180 calories per hour (women)

Office work:

  • Standing desk: 186 calories per hour for a 170-pound person
  • Sitting desk work: 100 calories per hour

As we transition from working with atoms to working with knowledge our bodies require a lot less energy to perform that work. Moving from construction work to sitting at a desk in an office requires 77.8 percent fewer calories per hour. Put another way, the calories needed to fuel one construction worker can power 4.5 office workers. The result is an economic system that creates more value with less resource consumption.

Fatal work injury rate

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports on fatalities on the job:

Farming, fishing, and forestry are the most dangerous professions at 24.4 fatal injuries, with transportation and material moving at 13.6, and construction and extraction at 12.9. Office and administrative support are the least risky professions at 0.6. Farmers, fishermen, and loggers are more than 40 times likely than an office worker to be killed on the job. Moving from construction work to sitting at a desk in an office reduces the risk of a work fatality by 95.3 percent. Adjusted for population size, construction workers experience a work-related fatality rate more than 21 times higher than that of office workers.

And it was much worse in the past—something that we tend to forget when looking at present statistics. In 1900, deaths in the mining and oil extractions fields (lumped under mining) was estimated at 333 per 100,000 workers and remained that high through the 1920s. We can hardly comprehend just how good we’ve got it now.

Calorie-fatality index

If we combine these two factors into a calorie-fatality index and compare the construction and office industries, we note that office work is 99 percent lower than construction work on the index. Moving from blue-collar construction work to an office job indicates an overall improvement factor of 96.75 (or 9,575 percent) on the calorie-fatality index.

Find more of Gale’s work at his Substack, Gale Winds.

World Health Organization | Food Consumption

Breastfeeding in Indonesia on the Rise

“In Indonesia … The rate of exclusive breastfeeding among infants under six months has steadily increased, rising from 52% in 2017 to 66.4% in 2024. However, many infants are not exclusively breastfed for the full six months – the duration required to achieve the full health benefits.”

From World Health Organization.