Are you kidding me? No it absolutely does not. I make every single one of my meals in less than 15 minutes including cleanup time. I have been doing this for 10+ years.

It would be at least a 15 minute round trip to the drive thru from my house and would cost 5x as much and be 10x less healthy.

Making simple meals takes just a few minutes.

My most common lunch is a salad that takes all of 5 minutes to chop the vegetables. My most common dinner is a bowl of steamed vegetables that takes seconds to throw in the microwave, and a baked potato that takes seconds to put in the toaster oven a half-hour ahead of time. Oatmeal or eggs for breakfast take five minutes or less too.

Unless you really work incredible hours, like a 16 to 24 hour medical shift or something, citing time as a reason not to prepare food is either looking for an excuse or way overshooting on the complexity needed.

Time is valuable whether you work 16 hour days or 2 hour days.

Wasting it on mindless things like chopping vegetables or washing pots and pans is of course a choice you are free to make, but it is a foolish one in my view.

It's usually about 2x the time to clean up after a meal than it is to actually prepare it, in my experience. The cooking is easy, but cooking makes a mess of the stove, of the pots and pans, of the utensils, et c.

I‘ve never cleaned up longer than 5 minutes after a meal, and I‘m cooking 1-2x a day for a family of four. Cook just one dish, ideally in a single pan/pot or in the oven. Get a pressure cooker for one-pot-dishes, ideally a smart one with auto-shutdown. Get machine-washable utensils. Get a self-cleaning stove (who cares about the mess anyway). Coated pans can just be rinsed with a soft brush and dried immediately (only smelly stuff like fish needs to be soaked).