I heard a joke in a commercial once that said: "We're so broke, we got married just for the rice." At the time that I saw this I was probably still in high school, worrying more about whether my pants were tight enough than about my financial future. Little did I know that I would soon take my first step into the real world - a world where even the university that I attend has yet to stop fishing for the last few pennies in my pocket.
If you are broke, you understand. You get done paying your electric, cable, and gas bills, to find that you have $100 to get you through the remainder of the month. You come to North Campus and after class your stomach starts grumbling. Reluctantly, you pay $4 for one chicken sandwich in the Student Union. All the while you think that if you keep spending like this, you're going to have to find something cheaper than Barton's rum for the upcoming weekend.
The Commons has expanded within the past year, adding restaurants with Indian and Japanese backgrounds. While I enjoy the idea of some ethnic diversity in my diet, I can already see the image of my frowning face as I hand $9 over the counter in exchange for a plate of chicken and vegetables. "It's okay", I sigh, "I'll just have to shut off my heat for a few days."
My question to the people who set these prices is: do you sit around every day and laugh at the thought of how obnoxious this is? Everyone knows that on-campus eateries have a monopoly over the on-campus food market, because there aren't really any other stores within walking distance where students can get a decent meal. Why, when it's so obvious how much money the school is making off of these stores, do they continue to do it? You'd think they'd at least have the decency to hide their money sucking schemes. It's like one of those unwritten rules: socially accepted robbery.
I would say that the main thing that frustrates me is how expensive it is to eat healthy meals on campus. Anywhere you go, it's going to cost about $8 for any real amount of food, especially if you want a drink (factoring in food quality makes this price seem significantly more ridiculous). Someone who is just looking for a snack will probably end up paying the amount that a normal meal should cost.
Throughout this array of high-priced rotting salad, spongy pizza and dry chicken, a student could be at loss for any idea of what to do with, say...$3.
But alas, there is an option for this young lad. Burger King has come to the rescue of many a poor soul, sending many a poor artery home a little more clogged. If UB cares about its students, then why is this the only affordable option? It's easy to see that if burgers and fries and soda are the cheapest option, then that is probably what 90 percent of students who live on a budget will consume.
Forgive me for picturing a bunch of old tycoons sitting in mahogany chairs, wearing top hats and smoking cigars, every time I have to dig a little farther into my pocket for some change. It's just that I can't understand the thought process involved in charging students so much for nourishment. The people who do this, weren't they students at one point too? Did they ever experience the difficulty of staying healthy on a tight budget?
I totally understand the capitalistic idea here.
Making money is high up on the list of anyone's priorities, and rightly so. But what about getting students what they need? Where does that fit on this list of priorities?
