Can't Wait to See That New Food Pyramid!

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(PDF) are unobjectionable, although the effectiveness of measures such as "a next generation Food Pyramid" and "swapping out deep fryers for salad bars" in school cafeterias is open to question. And there are several coercive elements (not counting the taxes that will be needed to fund anti-obesity boondoggles):

Restaurants and vending machine operators subject to the new requirement in the Affordable Care Act which mandates conspicuous calorie counts on menu boards should be encouraged to begin displaying calorie counts as soon as possible....

The food and beverage industry should extend its self-regulatory program to cover all forms of marketing to children, and food retailers should avoid in-store marketing that promotes unhealthy products to children....

All media and entertainment companies should limit the licensing of their popular characters to food and beverage products that are healthy and consistent with science-based nutrition standards....

The food and beverage industry and the media and entertainment industry should jointly adopt meaningful, uniform nutrition standards for marketing food and beverages to children, as well as a uniform standard for what constitutes marketing to children....

Industry should provide technology to help consumers distinguish between advertisements for healthy and unhealthy foods and to limit their children's exposure to unhealthy food advertisements.

Lest you think those last few recommendations are purely voluntary, the report adds that "if voluntary efforts to limit the marketing of less healthy foods and beverages to children do not yield substantial results, the FCC could consider revisiting and modernizing rules on commercial time during children's programming." It also notes that "the prospect of regulation or legislation has often served as a catalyst for driving meaningful reform in other industries" and suggests that such threats "may do so in the context of food marketing as well." Which makes you wonder how the Obama administration will respond if restaurants fail to "consider their portion sizes, improve children's menus, and make healthy options the default choice whenever possible."

What unites both the coercive and the noncoercive elements of this plan is the failure to consider that the values, tastes, and preferences of children and their parents-which are not entirely a product of breakfast cereal commercials-will shape how they respond to the new options and new information that the task force wants to foist upon them. Kids who do not like salad will not suddenly start eating it just because French fries are no longer available in the cafeteria. People who are not inclined to worry much about the nutritional content of their food are not likely to make use of calorie counts on menu boards, new-and-improved labels on packaged food, or radically redesigned (but still pyramidy) dietary charts.

Likewise, the task force's prescription of subsidies as a response to "food deserts" (areas without decent grocery stores) puts the cart before the horse. If supermarket chains stay out of certain neighborhoods because of security concerns or regulatory barriers, local government can do things to make the environment more hospitable for Walmart, Super Target, and Shop Rite. But if they stay out because there is not enough demand for the fresh produce and the other "affordable, healthy foods" that the task force wants everyone to eat, luring them in with subsidies will not do much to change people's diets and will require ongoing corporate welfare.

Not that I want the government to take on the task of changing people's values, tastes, and preferences so that they will make the correct choices in the new food and activity environment it is striving to create. Given what that would entail, we are much better off with lame recommendations about school gardens, farmers' markets, and "the AAP guidelines on screen time."



I guess less obesity would be a good thing, but I want to make sure that government respects the autonomy of folks. I understand making certain information available to folks so they can use it to make better choices, but if a person just wants to engage in things that make them obese then that is really none of the goverment's business. The person has already made the choice that their welfare is increased by being allowed to engage in such activity, second-guessing it would be wrong.

Individual autonomy should be primary - right up until it starts affecting others' lives. I'm pretty sure every third person in 'Murka being obese is having a substantial impact on the lives of other non-obese Americans, particularly in the taxes necessary to provide the healthcare necessary for these people. When your problem becomes my problem I think that's a valid time for the government to take an interest in resolving the problem.

Obese people (30+ BMI) die significantly sooner than thinner, healthier people. You do pay more in the short term, but you don't have to pay decades of Social Security and Medicare. If anything, the massive enfattening of America is good for her entitlement balance sheet.

What, by telling them to pay for their own healthcare since they're fat?

Once you force people to take welfare and use that welfare to demand concessions from them, you might have as well have simply forced those concessions on them directly -- the "welfare" is just a rationalization for those who still have a nagging feeling that personal autonomy matters.

Kids who do not like salad will not suddenly start eating it just because French fries are no longer available in the cafeteria.

I'm sure a few words from me will change their minds.

I must be an old fogey, but schools have deep fryers now? In 12 years of public school lunches I never had anything deep fried. Also, schools had no vending machines, and nobody was allowed to eat or drink anything in class. Perhaps if schools returned to the policies they had pre-obesity epidemic, there'd be less obesity?

And get off of my lawn!

We had one vending machine in my high school. It sold apples for a nickle apiece. The scramble for a spare nickle was fierce while racing to the after-athletic-practice bus.

Actually eating several mini-meals per day, rather than three big ones, promotes a higher metabolism. So forbidding students from eating outside of lunch time isn't going to help.

You assume that kids eating in school outside of lunch constitutes "mini-meals." I doubt it does. It's just extra food. The mini-meals thing doesn't work if it just adds to your regular meals.

Additional information:

Capitol Food Court Offers Healthy Food Options and Easy Access to
New iPhone application software on healthy food options
African Americans' Access to Healthy Food Options in South Los
Baltimore Plans For Healthier Food Options wjz.com
Healthy Food Options and Paid Meals coming this Fall on
News Center
University of Miami School of Law Healthy Food Options
Healthy Food Options
Food Fitness
Healthy food options offered at Philly's Citizens Bank Park
http://reason.com/blog/2010/05...

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