History Main / OnlyElectricSheepAreCheap

* Free range or organic foods tend to be more expensive and luxurious then the industrial kind. Much like the gemstones above, this is almost entirely marketing.

This trope typically occurs when one character encounters an object, usually food or an animal, and questions the owner about it. They may ask "Is this real?" to which the owner of a synthetic item/cloned animal replies "Of course not." That, or, if the character is meant to be fabulously wealthy and eccentric, they'll say "Of course."

This trope typically occurs when one character encounters an object, usually food or an animal, and questions the owner about it. They may ask "Is this real?" to which the owner of a synthetic item/cloned animal replies "Of course not." Or if the character is meant to be fabulously wealthy and eccentric, they'll say "Of course."

However, this trope can be justified if pollution or disease have directly attack the remaining real organisms' fertility. For agricultural products, it may be further explained by an economy of scale -- once most people switch to the cheaper synthetic product, the real thing becomes even ''more'' expensive because it's made in smaller quantities. Moreover, plants are one of the few instances where life is quite inefficient. [[https://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2011/solar-cells-more-efficient-than-photosynthesis- Even modern photovoltaic cells are more efficient than plants]].[[note]]though the comparison isn't entirely fair as solar panels don't have to synthetize sugar[[/note]]

However, this trope can be justified if pollution or disease have reduced the remaining real organisms' fertility. For agricultural products, it may be further explained by an economy of scale -- once most people switch to the cheaper synthetic product, the real thing becomes even ''more'' expensive because it's made in smaller quantities. Moreover, plants are one of the few instances where life is quite inefficient. [[https://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2011/solar-cells-more-efficient-than-photosynthesis- Even modern photovoltaic cells are more efficient than plants]].[[note]]though the comparison isn't entirely fair as solar panels don't have to synthetize sugar[[/note]]

In many near-future {{dystopia}}n science fiction settings, prices on some items, particularly natural things created by natural processes, are quite high, as opposed to mass-produced via synthetic processes. This is particularly the case if the setting is specifically shown to be one of [[GaiasLament severe environmental degradation]], where agriculture is difficult or natural agricultural products unsafe, where most natural-born animals are extinct, or where resources are stretched so thin that raising something as superfluous as a live pet is madness. Either way, people just take it for granted that certain things are not to be had for regular folks, or that if they are, they're grown in batches in laboratories or in the case of animals, may be machines designed to look like the real thing.

This trope typically occurs when one character encounters an object, usually food or an animal, and questions the owner about it. They may ask "Is this real?" to which the owner of a synthetic item/cloned animal replies "Of course not." Or if the character is meant to be fabulously wealthy, or only the best will do, and the item is natural it could be "Of course."

In many near-future {{dystopia}}n science fiction settings, prices on some items, particularly natural things created by natural processes, are quite high, as opposed to mass-produced via synthetic processes. This is particularly the case if the setting is specifically shown to be one of [[GaiasLament severe environmental degradation]], where agriculture is difficult or natural agricultural products unsafe, or where most natural-born animals are extinct. People just take it for granted that certain things are not to be had for regular folks, or that if they are, they're grown in batches in laboratories, or in the case of animals, they may be machines designed to look like the real thing.

However, this trope can be justified if pollution or disease have reduced the remaining real organisms' fertility and. For agricultural products, it may be further explained by an economy of scale -- once most people switch to the cheaper synthetic product, the real thing becomes even ''more'' expensive because it's made in smaller quantities. Moreover, plants are one of the few instances where life is quite inefficient. [[https://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2011/solar-cells-more-efficient-than-photosynthesis- Even modern photovoltaic cells are more efficient than plants]].[[note]]though the comparison isn't entirely fair as solar panels don't have to synthetize sugar[[/note]]

Normally, this can be written off as ArtisticLicenseBiology. Making more of themselves is something that living things tend to be pretty good at, so supply isn't an issue. Moreover, you'd be surprised at how little energy animals need to survive. The human body, assuming one does not engage in constant strenuous activity, runs on a daily average of 100 watts. You have appliances in your home that consume several times that amount of energy. And keep in mind, most animals -- paricularly reptiles such as in the page image -- run on even less than that. One of the reasons for this is cellular respiration being able to convert 40% of glucose's chemical energy into ATP. It doesn't sound like much, but keep in mind most top-of-the-line internal combustion engines struggle to convert just 30% of octane's chemical energy into motion. Animals are very efficient.

However, this trope can be justified if pollution or disease have reduced the remaining real organisms' fertility and/or population to the point of near extinction. For agricultural products, it may be further explained by an economy of scale -- once most people switch to the cheaper synthetic product, the real thing becomes even ''more'' expensive because it's made in smaller quantities. Moreover, plants are one of the few instances where life is quite inefficient. [[https://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2011/solar-cells-more-efficient-than-photosynthesis- Even modern photovoltaic cells are more efficient than plants]].[[note]]though the comparison isn't entirely fair as solar panels don't have to synthetize sugar[[/note]]

However, this trope can be justified if pollution or disease have reduced the remaining real organisms' fertility and/or population to the point of near extinction. For agricultural products, it may be further explained by an economy of scale -- once most people switch to the cheaper synthetic product, the real thing becomes even ''more'' expensive because it's made in smaller quantities. Moreover, plants are one of the few instances where life is less efficient than non-organic technology. [[https://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2011/solar-cells-more-efficient-than-photosynthesis- Even modern photovoltaic cells can beat plants]] (though the comparison isn't entirely fair as solar panels don't have to synthethize sugar).

However, this trope can be justified if pollution or disease have reduced the remaining real organisms' fertility. For agricultural products, it may also be explained by an economy of scale -- once most people switch to the cheaper synthetic product, the real thing becomes even ''more'' expensive because it's made in smaller quantities.

This trope typically occurs when one character encounters an object, usually food or an animal, and questions the owner about it. They may ask "Is this real?" to which the owner of a synthetic item/cloned animal replies "Of course not." Or if the character is meant to be fabulously wealthy, or only the best will do, and the item is natural it could be "Of course."

Normally, this can be written off as ArtisticLicenseBiology. Making more of themselves is something that living things tend to be pretty good at, so supply isn't an issue. Moreover, you'd be surprised at how little energy animals consume to stay alive. The human body, assuming one does not engage in constant strenuous activity, runs on a daily average of 100 watts. You have appliances in your home that consume several times that amount of energy. And keep in mind, most animals -- paricularly reptiles such as in the page image -- run on even less than that. However, this trope can be justified if pollution or disease have reduced the remaining real organisms' fertility. For agricultural products, it may also be explained by an economy of scale -- once most people switch to the cheaper synthetic product, the real thing becomes even ''more'' expensive because it's made in smaller quantities.

Can be written off as ArtisticLicenseBiology, if it's not justified by pollution or disease having reduced the remaining real organisms' fertility. Making more of themselves is something that living things tend to be pretty good at, after all. For agricultural products, it may be explained by an economy of scale -- once most people switch to the cheaper synthetic product, the real thing becomes even ''more'' expensive because it's made in smaller quantities.

* In ''TabletopGame/{{Paranoia}}'' real food, as with everything, is distributed according to security clearance. Infrareds get nothing, Reds get real food as a reward, and so on up; it isn't until Blue that a clone gets nothing but real food.

* Kaylee eating a strawberry in the ''{{Series/Firefly}}'' pilot. It was [[EroticEating orgasmic]].
** Later Jayne buys a bushel of apples and everybody reacts to this as an amazing treat and question his motives. Simon mentions that the food on a spaceship is considerably worse than planetside, but he ''is'' a Core-worlder, and isn't used to how Rim worlds don't have quality food. The apples remind Mal and Zoe of a rather nasty war story; during the Unification War, a favored tactic of Alliance soldiers was to leave fresh fruit lying around - with pressure-triggered ''grenades'' hidden inside.
--->'''Zoe''': Cap’n said wait, but they were so hungry… Don’t make much noise, just little pops and there’s three guys that kinda just… end at the rib cage.
** {{Inverted}} by the goods in the pilot episode; at first, they appear to be gold bars. However, they're eventually revealed to be concentrated protein bars wrapped in gold foil; each capable of feeding a family of four for a month, they're a ''lot'' more useful than mere gold. Also a nod to historical piracy and smuggling. During [[WoodenShipsAndIronMen the age of sail]], the most common booty cargo was molasses; non-perishable, high-calorie, packed with calcium and potassium... and that's ''before'' you turn it into rum.
** Another easy to miss example is the apple-peeling machine on Badger's desk in the pilot. On first glance it's just a weird instrument, but in the light of this trope and Badger's character, [[FridgeBrilliance it becomes apparent that it's one of his ways to demonstrate his higher status]].
* In an inorganic variant, a bandit chieftain in the story ''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS17E3TheCreatureFromThePit The Creature from the Pit]]'' from the original series of ''Series/DoctorWho'' was once seen to wax rhapsodic about the amazing treasures his group has stolen: precious items of iron, zinc, and even ''nickel!'' Needless to say, this scene takes place on a metal-poor planet, where only members of the elite [[spoiler: who got them by robbing and betraying an inoffensive alien ambassador]] can boast such prizes.
** Not to mention his FamousLastWords after being stabbed: "Tempered steel...is that really...tempered steel?"
** In ''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS15E4TheSunMakers The SunMakers]]'', Gatherer Hade is shown to be one of the richest members of the evil company that controls a dystopian society on Pluto by his having a desk made of real mahogany. The member of the oppressed underclass who admires it has only seen a picture of a tree, and even the Gatherer himself mispronounces it "ma-ho-''ga''-ny". Later, he offers the Doctor a raspberry leaf as a rare treat.

* ''Series/StargateSG1'' has an odd example. A BigEater Goa'uld is unfamiliar with and can easily be bribed by foods he's never heard of... like chicken and turkey. We don't know much about the ecology of most planets in the galaxy, but apparently the TransplantedHumans that make up 90 percent of all aliens didn't take any fowl with them.
-->'''Nerus:''' And this seedless watermelon--how do you get the seeds out?\\
'''Landry:''' Sorry, state secret.

* Eobard Thawne mentions in the season 1 finale of '"Series/TheFlash2014'' that, in the 22nd century, cows have become extinct, which explain his love of burgers in the 21st century.
* In Lloyd Biggle, Jr.'s short story, "Wings of Song", an eccentric collector in the far future stumbles across a priceless antique violin, made of actual wood. He's never even seen any before, as apparently Earth is a completely barren wasteland due to war.

-->'''Sarkoff:''' Beautiful, aren't they. Earth insects of the order Lepidoptera.
-->'''Blake:''' Butterflies.
-->'''Sarkoff:''' Ah, so you're an historian, are you?

-->'''Sarkoff:''' It's interesting, isn't it, that when that term "natural history" was originated, it referred to the study of living things. It was much later that it came to mean the study of things long since past and dead. History in its more conventional sense.

** Inadvertently gets a laugh in the ''Tir Tairngire'' sourcebook, also from TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}, when it's mentioned that the elves have somehow re-created extinct species for their wilderness areas. It's funny in that both of the named species, grizzly bears and gray wolves, are not only still alive and well today ''without'' any magical or cloning assistance, but they would have had to go extinct, all over the world and also in captivity, in ''less than a decade'' after the supplement was published, in order to meet the timeline suggested for their "extinction".

* ''TabletopGame/{{Cyberpunk}} 2020'' plays this by the same lines as Shadowrun. Fresh food is an expensive commodity, only within the reach of rich people, and most of the population lives eating Kibble (a mass-produced food identical in all respects to the pet food that gives it its name) and what is basically artificial food not much better than Kibble. (Live) pets, short of wild animals, are expensive too, and one of the Chromebooks even features one corporation whose business follow the lines of pay-us-and-we-bring-you-the-animal-you-wants, even if it has to be stealing it from someone or worse.
* In past editions of ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' which include the Elemental Plane of Air in their cosmology, ''dirt'' is considered a valuable commodity on that plane, as it's made up of gas-filled space. Anyone who wants to build a floating castle must either import some dirt to build it on, or (more cheaply) use magic to solidifly a cloud for a foundation.
* In the ''TabletopGame/{{Mystara}}'' D&D supplement "The Shadow Elves", the subterranean elf city's grandest and most-admired public avenue is lined by a dozen or so small trees, grown from precious cuttings brought down from the legendary surface and provided for with fertilizer and artificial lights. Elven tourists come hundreds of miles through twisted tunnels and caverns just to see them.
* ''TabletopGame/EclipsePhase'' takes place after a hurried evacuation of Earth and colonization of the rest of the solar system. Naturally grown food, especially meat, is expensive due to the shortage of inhabitable space, but culture vats and [[MatterReplicator nanofabricators]] can produce substitutes that snobs ''insist'' they can detect - but it's compared to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_wine_tasting modern-day wines.]] Now organic bodies, those are expensive because they take three years to grow and there's a lot of demand from the billions of {{Virtual Ghost}}s in storage, while most Synthmorphs can be printed out in a matter of hours.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Xenosaga}}'', we view one of Ziggy's memories in which he gives his son a robotic dog as a pet, as he was regretfully unable to obtain a real one.
* ''VideoGame/{{BioShock|1}}''. The city of Rapture, being entirely underwater, does not contain enough farmland for growing nonessential crops or raising cattle, so real beef and tobacco aren't available except through Fontaine's smuggling operation. Somehow, Rapture's scientists have managed to synthesize both from what they do have on hand, which seems to be mainly sea life, and it's implied that customers generally don't mind.
** One of the splicers complains about the quality of a steak she's found, though given the setting it's probably rotten by that point.

* ''VideoGame/NexusClash'' plays InexplicablyPreservedDungeonMeat absolutely straight, but this trope comes up a lot in more serious role-playing. Fruits and vegetables can be grown in the abandoned city that became the battlefield of Valhalla, but there are few if any animals to eat, and meat, eggs and dairy can only be preserved for so long.
* Growing regular crops in ''VideoGame/ProjectAura'' is ''difficult'' -- the game happens AfterTheEnd, thousands of years after climate change has rendered the Earth uninhabitable and Humanity had to turtle within energy shields in order to not die from exposure to the harsh elements, and [[GameplayAndStoryIntegration producing their food reflects that]]. To grow natural crops you first need to research the ability to scavenge seeds from the seabed, send your seabed trawling airships for some seeds, restore them to good condition in a lab using a Core Research Document that costs five Research Documents (and getting them is not easy -- they are crafted out of Innovation Points that are generated from activities such as seaweed production, water desalinization or recycled garbage production, and one cycle of these activities yields barely one tenth of an Innovation Point), and then plant the seeds in a Botanic Garden, which also consumes one Research Document. As a result, if you want to feed your citizens something tastier than processed seaweed, you need to keep the green documents flowing, and in order to do that, you need an obscenely developed material recycling industry.

* ''Webcomic/StandStillStaySilent'': Inverted. A spare part for a mechanical vehicle can cost as much as a healthy work horse, resulting in mechanical vehicles being used only by the military while civilians go around in horse-drawn carriages. Supplmentary material has also mentioned sugar to have become quite expensive.
* ''Webcomic/SaturdayMorningBreakfastCereal'': In one theoretical future, advertisements generate revenue by annoying their customers into paying a fee to skip the ad. Marketing loses sight of the greater goal and creates increasingly annoying troll-adverts that pervade into regular advertising, dooming any product that needs adverts of any kind. As a result, mass-produced basic needs are extremely cheap, but ''any'' luxury (including ketchup) is near-impossible to find and costs trillions of dollars. Humanity backslides into a dystopian mass-produced subsistence life as all media and art is repurposed to torment its viewers. Of course, the punchline is that humans still pretend bad media is entertaining and funny.

* In one episode of ''Anime/TheBigO'', pet animals are in fact so rare that everyone is quite shocked when Dorothy finds a cat. The owners come and take it back despite how attached Dorothy has gotten [[spoiler:because it's really their son. A mad scientist turns people into animals ''because'' they're so incredibly rare. Or something. Later, it gets turned into a giant monster.]] They're ''that'' rare, apparently.

* In ''Manga/{{Clover}}'', one character owns an organic cat but disguises it as a robot so people won't steal it.

* In [[Music/{{Voltaire}} Aurelio Voltaire]]'s ''[[ComicBook/ChiChian Chi-Chian]]'' series, there is a story of a blind pleasure-robot. Her eyes were stolen because they were made of the most valuable substance on the planet - pure wood. Yes, '''wood'''. [[MindScrew It's Chi-Chian]]. [[WhatDoYouMeanItWasntMadeOnDrugs Just go with it]].

* ''ComicBook/{{Fray}}''. It's difficult to be a Vampire Slayer in a future where there's a shortage of [[WoodenStake natural wood for stakes]].

* An early example of this is in ''Film/SoylentGreen'', where one character is excited about having "hundred and fifty bucks a jar of strawberries."

* In Mamoru Oshii's ''Film/{{Avalon}}'', the wealthy (compared to the abject poverty of her fellow players) Ash feeds her dog quality food, as contrasted to the gruel that her peers survive on.

* In the distant galaxy of ''[[Film/KinDzaDza Kin-Dza-Dza]]'', one of the transplanted Earthlings discovers that the wooden matchsticks he's carrying in his pocket are actually the most valuable things in the system, as ''every last scrap of naturally-occurring organic or mineral material'' had long since been converted into one kind of fuel or another. Water is bought by the ''drop'', and food is made of '''plastic'''.

* In ''Film/DemolitionMan'', society is entirely vegetarian. When they visit the 'scrap' society, he eagerly eats a hamburger. It's not beef... but at least it's not human. It's actually rat. He doesn't care and keeps on eating. He even says it's the best burger he's had in years. [[note]]Which is, admittedly, a LampshadeHanging on the fact it's the ''only'' burger he's had in years, having spent the last 30 of them in [[HumanPopsicle cryogenic stasis]].[[/note]] It bears mentioning that unlike most examples on this page, meat eating isn't rare due to global disaster, it's a sign of how overly coddled and pacified human civilization has been rendered.
* German sci-fi movie ''{{Sturzflieger}}''. At the end, the protagonists grow rich when they discover a store room full of chicks (not as in TheChick).

* In ''Film/TheAdventuresOfPlutoNash'', the events of the film take place on the Moon. Certain items are hard to come by on the Moon and aren't cheap to have delivered from Earth, the most commonly-mentioned being wood (not the stuff used in cheap RealLife furniture, but actual wood). At one point, a mobster is mentioned by someone to have had a briefcase made of genuine alligator skin. Naturally, this immediately outed him as an Earther.
* In ''VForVendetta'', Evey expresses amazement that V has access to real butter. He stole it from a shipment meant for the prime minister.

** In his short story ''Breakfast at Twilight'', an American family accidentally time-travel to WorldWarThree where they're accosted by a squad of malnourished American soldiers who have a ThisCannotBe reaction to their refrigerator stocked with milk, eggs, butter and meat. They plunder the contents and hide it in their transport before ThePoliticalOfficer arrives.
* Although the future depicted in the ''Literature/InDeath'' series is not especially dystopian, soy and vegetable imitation foods are very common, and it is a mark of Roarke's ImpossiblyCoolWealth that he always drinks real coffee, smokes real tobacco, and eats real beef. The coffee in particular is insanely expensive, and is made much of by Eve and her fellow cops.
* ''Literature/{{Schismatrix}}'' is set in a future founded by refugees of an ecological meltdown on Earth. Outside of cockroaches, most animals are extremely rare, and in certain places the same goes for food that isn't [[FutureFoodIsArtificial artificial]].
* Creator/ElizabethMoon's space opera series ''Literature/VattasWar''. With humanity scattered across space, the puppy Jim the stowaway finds is a mysterious novelty to most of the crew, though Jim, coming from a backwater world that relies on animal labor, knows what it is. Real food can be had but won't keep for long trips in space so it is a special treat supplemented by nutrition bars and [=MREs=]. When the main character's ship takes on refugees from other ships after a war breaks out, a snotty-ass captain makes a big deal about his personal stock of expensive raspberries being divvied out as rations.
** Oh, and the aforementioned dog (a Jack Russell?) ends up filling Jim's college fund when they arrive on a world where the local fauna has a tendency to kill dogs, making them rare and expensive. So they sell its sperm (in the same vein as selling racehorse sperm).
* In Creator/HarryHarrison's ''Literature/MakeRoomMakeRoom'' (which ''Film/SoylentGreen'' is based on) even soy-based faux steak is expensive and worth practically rioting over.

* ''Literature/TheWarAgainstTheChtorr''. When the government wants to hire the luxury airship Hieronymus Bosch, they have to use chocolate (among other things like coffee, oil or gold) in payment as money is becoming increasingly valueless.
* In ''Literature/TheSagaOfRecluce'' books Mag'i of Cyador/Scion of Cyador by L.E. Modesitt, Jr., an indication that the Empire is in decline is the increasing rarity of coffee.

* This trope is present throughout much of Creator/IsaacAsimov's fiction, although it's gone into more detail than usual in ''Literature/TheCavesOfSteel''.
* Neal Stephenson's ''Literature/TheDiamondAge'', in which one of the phyles bases its entire economy on providing luxurious hand-made goods for the Neo-Victorian elite, while everything else is produced in matter compilers. The TitleDrop is that diamond is now one of the cheapest materials you can have (because, being the absolute simplest pattern of the most common solid atom - a lattice of carbon - it's the easiest thing your matter compiler can make) but ''glass'' is a luxury good. The idea here is that the goods themselves are not important, but hand-made goods are valuable because they prove that you have enough power to compel another human being to take time out of their limited existence to make things for you, when you could have just gone to the nearest matter compiler and got the equivalent product with a snap of your fingers.

* ''Literature/WorldWarZ'' featured this when Arthur Sinclair was trying to negotiate with cattle ranchers to use their land to grow much-needed crops - they agreed only if their breeding stock remained untouched.
--> '''Arthur Sinclair''': "Tender, juicy steaks - can you imagine a better symbol for our artificial pre-war standard of living?"
** It's a point only because [[spoiler:the Solanum virus is fatal to all life, but only cause humans to turn into zombies. For anything else, it's just fatal and results in their flesh becoming unsafe for human consumption.]]
* In the [[Literature/VorkosiganSaga Vorkosigan universe]], this applies to some planets but not others. The heroine of the first two novels is from Beta Colony, a high tech but barely habitable desert planet, who winds up on on Barrayar, which has a breathable atmosphere, lots of running water, and trees all over the place, but is also socially and politically and to some extent technologically backwards on account of [[LostColony having been cut off from contact with the rest of the galaxy for a few centuries]] (only ending a couple of generations before the action of the books). She has to remind herself that on ''this'' planet things like wooden buildings and furniture mean poverty, not wealth.

* An interesting non-sci-fi example appears in Erich Maria Remarque's famous novel ''Literature/AllQuietOnTheWesternFront''. One of the soldiers in the story is overjoyed when he discovers ''an actual cherry tree in bloom'' during a march across the countryside to a new position. Since he (and the others) have spent entire weeks on the western front of UsefulNotes/WorldWarI, this is hardly surprising - the frontline being [[{{CorpseLand}} a lifeless war-torn muddy wasteland]] and all. [[TruthInTelevision And the less said about the rations given to soldiers in the latter parts of the war, the better...]]

* In ''TheRoar'', due to the Animal Plague and the poor being forced into the northern parts of the world [[spoiler:while the richest people in the world live in mansions in forests]] natural-grown food such as strawberries and even artificially produced meat were considered food only for the rich in the North.
** Not to mention [[spoiler:the animal plague never happened. It was made by the government and the rich to scare everybody behind The Wall so they could have the forests and wildlife all to themselves.]]
* In ''{{Literature/Quozl}}'' by Creator/AlanDeanFoster, the titular aliens live aboard a [[GenerationShips Generation Ship]], and as such value wood considerably. It's not rare on the planets they have colonized, but space travel takes decades and growing trees in such an environment is impractical. They have elaborate public wooden sculptures, but the most wood an individual Quozl is likely to own is a small ring.
* A variant happens in ''Literature/{{Dune}}'' when a Fremen representative spits on the table during their first meeting with House Atreides. One of the protagonists gets angry and tries to draw a weapon to repay the "slight", but Duke Leto stops him - the act was a gesture of respect, as water is incredibly scarce on Arrakis.
** Leto's horrified to learn of the many demeaning customs his rivals the Harkonnens instituted during their rule of Arrakis based on ''[[ConspicuousConsumption wasting water]]''; upon entering the palace, guests ceremonially splash water on the floor for servants to mop up with towels, who then sell the squeezings to the poor. They planted date palms everywhere, then put up ''DeflectorShields'' to keep peasants from eating the dates.
--->'''Yueh''': One date palm requires forty liters of water a day. A man requires but eight liters. A palm, then, equals five men.
*** Some of Leto's first rulings upon taking residence are to have the palms removed and for free water rations to be available to anyone who calls on the holding during mealtimes. It's a pragmatic move on his part as well as humanitarian, as it ensures that the people of Arrakis support his rule.
---->''How typical of a Harkonnen fief'', the Duke thought. ''Every degradation of the spirit that can be conceived.''
* In Creator/SergeyLukyanenko's ''Literature/LineOfDelirium'', spinach now has to be grown in absolutely sterile environments and is only available to the rich. This happened after human counter-intelligence agencies successfully "convinced" the [[MechanicalLifeforms Meklar]] that spinach was absolutely essential to human metabolism. The Meklar devoted large amounts of resources to develop a species-crossing retrovirus lethal to spinach and to deploy bomber fleets all across human space. Devastating losses in those fleets and the utter failure of the plan shocked the Meklar into a peace treaty, though.
* Joe Kimball's novel ''Timecaster'' does this without the environmental-degradation angle. It is set in a future "green utopia" in which every available surface is covered with growing plants -- virtually all of which are ultimately rendered into either food or much-needed biofuel. Making durable goods or luxury consumables out of natural materials is seen as wasteful; therefore, wooden furniture is a sign of decadent wealth while paper and drinkable alcohol are against the law.
* In Creator/LarryNiven's ''Saturn's Race'', the protagonist eats real meat in the insanely rich refuge of Xanadu and comments on how well-crafted this soymeat is. When she is informed that it is the real thing, she briefly considers whether she should be disgusted by the idea, but then decides to just treat it as a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
* The People in the ''Literature/ArtemisFowl'' series inhabit an underground civilization and seem to subsist mostly on foods preceded with ''sim-'' and things you can grow underground (like fungal goods). Sustainable and organic, but clearly not quite the same as surface food. (Not that they'd set up systems to get food from human farming, because of the pesticides.) The logical extension of this includes things like high-stakes seafood smuggling.
* In ''[[Literature/TheNightsDawnTrilogy The Naked God]]'', one character proudly shows off his 20th-century lava lamp, now a priceless and beautiful antique instead of a tacky room decoration.
* In ''Literature/{{Honorverse}}'' this is played on a more meta scale — food is, for the most part, neither scarce nor artificial, but the peculiarities of the hundreds of different biospheres, their interplay with the human-brought species, not to mentions various genetic tweaks made to them so they may prosper in their new homes, make sure that some commodities will pretty much ''always'' remain rare and coveted. For example, the genuine Terran whiskey is considered a rare and expensive treat even on Manticore (which is [[PortalNetwork one jump]] and three days away from the Earth), and while celery is widespread and largely consistent over the many inhabited worlds, only a Sphinxian one contains the "[[PsychicPowers telepathy vitamin]]" coveted by the native sentient species. The 'cats actually have the other, native source of that, but the celery is just much ''tastier''.
* A minor example in ''Literature/TheStormlightArchive''. One of the reasons why the gemstones used as currency in the setting are so valuable is that they are the only thing that cannot be created by [[MatterReplicator Soulcasters]].

* Order a soda at most any restaurant in the U.S., and you can have it refilled as much as you like at no extra charge. The stuff is so cheap and profit margins so high that they can afford to practically give it away. On the other hand, ask for something that's reasonably healthy and natural, like fruit juice, and you'll pay for every glass.
** Well, those sodas come from soda fountains, which simply carbonate tap water and then mix in some small amount of concentrated syrup, while the juices (even if it is made with concentrated juice) is delivered in their own container. The price for delivery and storage is such much higher (per serving) for anything but sodas.
** Also, this is basically a US-only policy (which generally have very low food prices anyway, globally-wise), the other countries usually cannot pass the chance to charge a steep markup for what is basically a sugared water, and outside of the States you can mainly encounter this in a US-originated restaurants that simply carried this tradition with them, or in places trying to invoke an American feel, where the owners believe that the atmosphere is more important.

* ''Literature/DoAndroidsDreamOfElectricSheep'', the novella upon which ''Film/BladeRunner'' was based, goes into this trope in more detail than the film. Real animal pets are considered the ultimate status symbol, and new editions of a blue book are published listing each species's going rate. Many species are thought to be extinct. The main character owns an electric sheep, but conceals the fact that is artificial. At the end of the book, [[spoiler:he discovers a toad, thought to be extinct, and thus priceless, but it turns out to be artificial as well.]]

* ''Fanfic/RocketshipVoyager''. While at the messdeck, Tom Paris and B'Elanna Torres have to eat yeast-based protein as the meat vats and hydroponics garden are still being repaired. Later Captain Janeway invites Chakotay for a formal dinner at the officer's wardroom and they have beef and vegetables from the ship's stores, though the taste is a bit off from the irradiation used to preserve it.

* ''{{TabletopGame/Warhammer40000}}'':

--->''How typical of a Harkonnen fief'', the Duke thought. ''Every degradation of the spirit that can be conceived.''

* An inversion is the price of meat. Until relatively recently, meat, especially red meat, was something most people would only have rarely if their farm animals died (it was more worthwhile to keep the animals alive for milk, eggs, wool to be produced consistently). Only the wealthy could afford to eat meat regularly, until mass farming became common lowering the price of meat, although the price may go up again as demand increases.

* Growing regular crops in ''VideoGame/ProjectAura'' is ''difficult'' -- the game happens AfterTheEnd, thousands of years after climate change has rendered the Earth uninhabitable and Humanity had to turtle within energy shields in order to not die from exposure to the harsh elements, and [[GameplayAndStoryIntegration producing their food reflects that]]. To grow natural crops you first need to research the ability to scavenge seeds from the seabed, send your seabed trawling airships for some seeds, restore them to good condition in a lab using a Core Research Document that costs five Research Documents, and then plant the seeds in a Botanic Garden, which also consumes one Research Document. As a result, if you want to feed your citizens something tastier than processed seaweed, you need to keep the green documents flowing, and in order to do that, you need an obscenely developed material recycling industry.

* ''ComicBook/{{Fray}}''. It's difficult to be a VampireSlayer in a future where there's a shortage of [[WoodenStake natural wood for stakes]].

* ComicBook/Fray}}''. It's difficult to be a VampireSlayer in a future where there's a shortage of [[WoodenStake natural wood for stakes]].