People buying name brand over the counter medication opposed to the generic has always been a huge pet peeve of mine (especially pain relief meds). I always think they are either ignorant of the facts or just easily duped (suckers).

As an example all these 'Excedrins' have exact ingredients in the exact amounts (250mg acetaminophen 250mg aspirin 65mg caffeine) and same number of pills(200)
@Wallmart
Excedrin Extra Strength $23.95
Excedrin Migraine $15.54
Equate(generic excedrin) $4.00
http://www.walmart.com/search/?query=excedrin

Blows my mind people buy Excedrin or Advil or Tylenol,etc.. and not the generics. Stop being suckers.

end of pet peeve rant

Also generic foods shouldn't be lumped together with generic medicines. Ive had lots of generic foods that taste like shit compared to the name brand. Salt is a no brainer and kind of a meh example. Compare Kraft Mac and Cheese with its store generic and see what you think.

With medications its about the active ingredients which are exactly the same. Generic foods and medicines are apples and oranges in my experience and opinion.

I worked in a bread factory briefly and we put the same white bread into about 15 different bags and with a swing in price points of about 50 cents. This was about 25 years ago so the swing is probably more like a dollar or more in todays terms.

I won't buy anything but Heinz ketchup. Everything else just tastes weird and/or too vinegary. That and Shreddies. Everything else, whatever.

President's Choice up here does a great mac+cheese btw. Don't know if it's available in the States.

That is true now more than ever. Back in the 90's most ingredients in name brand meds were still sourced outside of China. Now most ingredients are sourced from China, so you are taking the same chance of getting something wrong with name vs generic. Sadly, we still only check about 7% of the ingredients shipped in for quality, simply because of the sheer amount and cost that would be involved.

The generic food thing is rather silly since often as not there is more than one brand of food and they taste different. At most one of those brands is being used as the store brand which means the rest will taste different. Sometimes it is totally different as well, the store may contract a major company to make it, but still have their own formula.

Basically store-brand food is just another brand and should be treated as such. It can be very tasty, I'm personally a big fan of Safeway's store brand olive oil, but acting like store brand food is the same as brand name is the same as acting like Coke and Pepsi taste the same. No, it's different stuff, buy the stuff you like the best.

Not true.
The time release elements in real drugs are ususally better than in the generics.