No time to cook and yet the average American watches almost 5 hours of TV per day. (The number of hours watched per day actually climbs steadily as you get older, from around 2 to 7 hours per day.) You can even watch TV while you cook!
I also don't believe for a moment that "unprocessed" foods are more expensive. Rice, beans (dried or canned), frozen vegetables, canned tomatoes or paste, basic spices, and even most fresh produce costs less than highly processed foods like chips or microwave meals. Meats and dairy may seem more expensive to buy straight out, but those highly processed foods are not bargains loaded with lots of good meat and quality cheese; they have just enough to get you to buy the thing and lots and lots of salt.
I think the problem is education. I suspect there is a growing population of people who really don't know how to take basic ingredients and turn them into a meal. It does change the equation a bit when you have to take care of kids. That's one of the things that my parents and grandparents did: cooking was family time.