economics of second-hand produce

I think it's like this. The farmer's market on Hannover Street in the North End of Boston is not the 'farmer's market' concept I'm familiar, ie, farmers drive into the city to sell their wares.

No, it's not. What it is is farmers selling what they couldn't sell at the local grocery store and grocery stores dumping their shelves' produce for the starting week. It sounds disgusting until you realize that the produce is still within its freshness range, though on the lower end. It's not different from you buying some produce on Saturday (that's your grocery day) and not cooking it till Thursday. Some of the produce is farm fresh, but it's hard to tell.

Because food isn't always a black and white issue. There's some grey area there where what is acceptable for poor people is not so acceptable for rich ones. I'd rather buy 2 heads of 2-day old spinach then one 1-day old spinach (more likely, I'd buy a pound of carrots with the extra dough). The richer you are the less that kind of compromise you're likely to make.

Hungary is acting as Austria's second-week produce market. Some of that produce was probably produced in Hungary, shipped to Austria, sat on shelves/wharehouses, shipped back to Hungary when it wasn't sold in time, and is being sold in Hungary.

(Also the sellers at the Hannover St market are like village farmers - both extra nice 'here, have an apple pretty lady' and extra assholish, 'no you can't pick out which apples you're buying, I decide'.)