Editing No such thing as a free lunch (section)

==="Free lunch"===
The "free lunch" refers to the once-common tradition of [[Western saloon|saloon]]s in the [[United States]] providing a [[Free lunch|"free" lunch]] to patrons who had purchased at least one drink. Many foods on offer were high in salt (e.g., ham, cheese, and salted crackers), so those who ate them ended up buying a lot of beer. [[Rudyard Kipling]], writing in 1891, noted how he

<blockquote>...came upon a bar-room full of bad Salon pictures, in which men with hats on the backs of their heads were wolfing food from a counter. It was the institution of the "free lunch" I had struck. You paid for a drink and got as much as you wanted to eat. For something less than a rupee a day a man can feed himself sumptuously in San Francisco, even though he be a bankrupt. Remember this if ever you are stranded in these parts.<ref>{{cite book |first=Rudyard |last=Kipling |author-link=Rudyard Kipling |title=American Notes |publisher=Brown and Company |location=Boston |year=1899 |page=[https://archive.org/details/americannotesrud00kiplrich/page/18 18] |oclc=1063540 |url=https://archive.org/details/americannotesrud00kiplrich |access-date=31 May 2014}}<br/>{{Gutenberg|no=977|name=American Notes by Rudyard Kipling}}</ref></blockquote>

Some quotes exist from the time, arguing that these free lunches were not really free, such as in the Columbia ''Daily Phoenix'' of 1873: "One of the most expensive things in this city—Free lunch.",<ref>[https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84027008/1873-09-06/ed-1/seq-2/#words=Free+lunch Phoenixiana] Columbia, SC ''Daily Phoenix'' 1873-09-06 p. 2</ref> ''L. A. W. Bulletin'' 1897: "If no one ever paid for drinks, there would be no 'free lunch', and the man who confines his attention to the free lunch, alone, is getting what he knows others pay for."<ref>{{cite magazine | title=The 'Free Lunch' Gang | magazine=L. A. W. Bulletin and Good Roads | volume=25 | number=24 | date=11 June 1897 | page=714 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JgcAAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA714 }}</ref> and the ''Washington Herald'' 1909: "as a matter of fact, there is no such thing as free lunch. Somebody has to pay for it."<ref>{{cite news | title=Mr. Tillman's idea that free lunch is good enough for anybody | newspaper=The Washington Herald | date=2 November 1909 | page=6 | url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045433/1909-11-02/ed-1/seq-6/#words=lunch }}</ref> When Chicago attempted to ban free lunches in 1917, Michael Montague, a saloon owner, made the case that "There is no such thing as free lunch. First of all, you have to buy something from the saloonkeeper before you can partake of the lunch. Lunch is the greatest tempering influence in the saloon. If a man takes a two-ounce drink of [[whisky]] and then takes a bite of lunch, he probably does not take a second drink. Whisky taken alone creates an appetite. If you want to create the use of whisky, pass this ordinance."<ref>{{cite news | title=Saloonman Denies Lunches Provided Patrons Are Free | newspaper=Oklahoma City Times | date=25 May 1917 | volume=29 | issue=47 | page=1 | url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86064187/1917-05-25/ed-1/seq-1/#words=lunch }}</ref>

TANSTAAFL, on the other hand, applies this more generally, and indicates an acknowledgement that in reality a person or a society cannot get "something for nothing". Even if something appears to be free, there is always a cost to the person or to society as a whole, although that may be a [[hidden cost]] or an [[externality]]. For example, as Heinlein has one of his characters point out, a bar offering a free lunch will likely charge more for its drinks.<ref>{{cite book |last=Heinlein |first=Robert A. |author-link=Robert A. Heinlein |title=[[The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress]] |publisher=Tom Doherty Associates |location=New York |year=1997 |orig-year=1966 |pages=8–9 |isbn=0-312-86355-1}}</ref>