Current federal agricultural subsidies focus on financing production of food commodities, a large portion of which are converted into high-fat meat and dairy products, refined grains, high-calorie juices and soft drinks (sweetened with corn sweeteners), and processed and packaged foods.
Karen R. Siegel, Ph.D., of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, and coauthors used data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey from 2001 to 2006 to calculate an individual-level "subsidy score" for consumption of subsidized food commodities as a percentage of total calorie intake.
The study, which relied on a single day of 24-hour dietary recall, included 10,308 participants, about half of whom were men, with an average age of about 40.