If even chocolate is getting worse, what does that tell us about our economy and the state of life’s small pleasures?
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In today’s episode, Vox host Jonquilyn Hill talks to New York Magazine writer Rachel Handler, who spent seven months investigating that question and uncovered a story that goes well beyond candy. Handler explains how manufacturing has changed, what chocolate reveals about corporate profits and inequality, and why even life’s smallest pleasures increasingly feel like luxuries.
They explore the hidden costs of convenience, whether we’ve learned to like inferior products, and the indignity of being told nothing has changed, even when we can taste the difference. What do we lose when we stop expecting everyday things to be good? And what would it take to make a decent chocolate bar an ordinary pleasure everyone can afford?
Host: Jonquilyn Hill, host of Explain It To Me
Guest: Rachel Handler, features writer for New York Magazine
Chapters
00:00 Intro
01:24 Why does chocolate taste worse now?
11:15 What’s actually in your chocolate?
17:34 Who pays the price for cheap chocolate?
20:01 Is good chocolate becoming a luxury?
25:37 What’s the hidden cost of convenience?
31:21 Have we learned to like worse chocolate?
33:23 Why this is about more than chocolate
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