Have you ever looked at milk in the fridge and saw it expired one day ago so you threw it away? Having food labels can make almost half of Americans waste their money and throw out lots of food that is still consumable. In the passage, “The Dating Game: Demystifying Food Expiration Dates To Reduce Food Waste” by Emily Broad Leib and “Food date labels might not mean what you think they mean” by Kristofer Husted, both consider the advantages and disadvantages of having food labels. Food labels have been around for years, while having some good outcomes and some terrible outcomes. However, since the food labeling has failed it brings up the topic, “Should the current system of putting date labels on food be changed? Food labels/labeling should be changed because it's making Americans waste their money and throw out the food that they need. …show more content…
One reason food labels should be changed is, it confuses consumers if the date is best consumable or if the food is well-expired.Because of current food labeling it is confusing consumers more than 8/9 of consumers throw away their food after seeing the date.In the passage, “ The Dating Game: Demystifying Food Expiration Dates To Reduce Food Waste” This evidence shows the number of Americans who waste food. Leib states “Yet according to an industry report, “90% of consumers say they throw food away on this date because of safety concerns.” This shows that the article explains how just seeing the date can make consumers throw food away. This quote is important because it really shows how much consumers waste their money and food on just seeing a little date label on their yogurt container. Many people can still be perfectly fine after eating food that had a ‘best by’ date the day before. They will be fine because the best by date is just the creators opinion on what the food will be best consumable. These numbers of food waste support the claim that food labeling needs to be
Restaurants have a greater possibility of getting more money if they have "special" nutritional labels. Many people dislike the food label, yet some people are for them. Labels would not benefit anyone because they are not always right, and they sometimes just want the state to give them As for their grade, yet it sometimes if negative to have new foods on the menu. A food has to be evaluated before put on the menu, therefore it would be even more complicated. The author proclaims, "But for the restaurant, it is a nuisance and a potential threat to their business. It means that before a new item goes on the menu, it has to be evaluated." This statement explains that before a new item goes on the menu trouble is beginning. Labels are no help they just bring in more money because prices get higher from healthy
Knowledge is power, the more the consumer knows about the food they are eating the healthier choices they’ll make. For instance, in McDonald’s Grilled Honey Mustard Snack Wrap and a small French fry, from McDonald’s is around $6.00 and contains 420 calories 24g of fat (6.0g saturated).If you were to compare that to a Big Mac meals that comes with medium size fries and coke soda would be about 980 calories the Snack Wrap would be a healthier alternative and it would be about the same price $6.00. When fast food chains put labels on their food like McDonald’s consumers can’t
By accepting misguided information about the food that is being purchased from the marketers, consumers are letting the food industry shape buying patterns, even when it is not to their benefit. Pollan supports this claim when he writes, “With all the variety and constant stream of messages from the food industry and media, how can we make up our minds” (86). Pollan’s quote elaborates on how the the constant stream of messages affects what Americans put into their bodies.
Zinczenko shares his personal story about how fast-food restaurants such as Taco Bell and McDonald’s led to a weight problem during his high-school years. He claims that the ease of accessibility and lack of healthy alternatives make it all too easy to fall into the cycle of unhealthy eating. Zinczenko also contends that the lack of nutrition labels on fast-food products leaves the consumer in the dark about what he or she is actually consuming. At the time Zinczenko wrote his article, fast-food restaurants were not willingly disclosing nutritional values of their products. Today this has changed. Fast-food companies, including McDonald’s, have put the full nutritional information of their products directly on the packaging and wrappers. All other fast-food establishments either post it on the menu board (Panera), offer easy access to pamphlets containing all nutritional information of their menu in store, or have it easily accessible online (Taco Bell, KFC). I am sure that this is a helpful step forward toward educating the public as to what they are consuming, but has this new knowledge to consumers had a dramatic change toward ending obesity? No. People have always known that eating a Big Mac and fries with the giant soft drinks that McDonald’s and other chains offer is not healthy; putting the nutritional labels on these items has done little to nothing to stop people from eating these high-calorie meals. This again leads back to the point that people as consumers need to be more accountable to themselves and stop blaming others for what they willingly choose to put in their
The act of manufactures labeling of our foods products in terms of the ingredients a particular product contains and the nutritious facts is sometimes taken for granted, we often see the labels on our food products, but ignore them because we’re so used to seeing them in our daily lives. Surprisingly, food product labeling, specifically that pertaining to allergen warnings, were not always available to consumers until a government mandate in 2004 (FALCPA). I think part of the reason for such a lateness in regulation was due to a social stigma regarding allergies, that having them was some sort of natural selection and not an issue that should be taken care of. Another surprising notion I came across was that although there was no government regulation, manufactures of food products took a good amount of initiative in letting their consumers know of potential allergens in their products.
In conclusion, all aspects of food labelling, from nutrition facts to words and symbols, are all regulated to help provide consumers with accurate information about products. However, industry practices seeking to inflate product values through labelling or hide seemingly undesirable facts only serve to limit the consumers’ knowledge. Legislation attempts to deal with this, but food companies are still generally able to work around laws. If implemented correctly, the benefits of nutrition labelling according to the Food and Consumer Products of Canada (FCPC), " over the next 20 years will save $5 billion in health costs in preventing cancer, diabetes, and heart disease, according to a government study." (Starphoenix). Sadly, labelling is still used as a method of influencing sales and international trade rather than helping consumers make good purchasing choices.
For instance, in McDonald’s grilled honey mustard snack warp plus small French fries, 420 calories 24g (6.0g saturated)that could be about six dollars. When fast food chains put labels on their food like McDonalds its consumer can’t blame McDonalds for selling them unhealthy food when they could see how many calories the food contains. Even though the article “Don’t blame the eater” is outdated, fast food chains have made a change for its customer by putting websites about their nutrition and even putting the calories table on the wrappers of the burgers or other food items. Zinczenko had many valid points on what fast food chain should do about the calorie labels. Then in 2011 many fast food chains had started to put the calorie charts on their food, but in 2015 the FDA has passed the labeling requirement for a restaurant which also go’s for retail food establishment and vending machines. So when it comes to people over eating it’s on them for not looking at the labels on the food. But it could also be that the food of the fast food is so cheap that people don’t care what is in their food and how bad the food is for them. Even if the families see how badly the food is they could still make an effort to exercise and balances how they
He argues that tobacco labels have warnings yet fast food does not. However, this argument fails to recognize the fact that anything is bad in large amounts (Bowerman). According to Doctor Andrew Weil, too much fruit can hurt one’s effort to lose weight, and it can even raise a person’s risk of developing cardiovascular disease. These risks for fruit exist, yet nobody complains that there are no warning labels on apples. This serves to show that anything has the ability to make a person unhealthy. A diet that includes occasional fast food will not cause a person to become overweight as long as the diet is balanced. Again, this comes down to a person’s choice. If the person chooses to monitor calorie intake and maintains a diet with a variety of good foods, he will keep a healthy lifestyle. Additionally, the author’s complaint that fast food companies sell products “with proven health hazards and no warning labels” further proves that the knowledge is available for anyone to obtain (Zinczenko 464). If parents have a concern about the food that they are buying for their children, they can search for and find this information and adjust diets accordingly. The author also states that health information is available upon request. It is up to the consumer to take action and take control of his own health rather than put the blame on the
Best selling author of Eat This, Not That, David Zinczenko’s article “Don’t Blame the Eater,” blames the fast food industry for the growing rate of obesity in the United States. Zinczenko’s main idea is that fast food companies should have warning labels on all the food they supply. Zinczenko believes that since health labels are put on tobacco and preserved food product, fast food industries should put labels on today’s fast food. Discussions about the availability of fast food compared to healthier alternative were brought up as well. Zinczenko states that when looked at, a salad from a fast food restaurant could add up to half of someone’s daily calories (155). He believes that because of fast food, Americans are having more health risks, which includes an insane rise in diabetes. Some agree with Zinczenko saying fast food companies should be the ones responsible to show people the truth about their foods. On the other hand Radley Balko, a columnist for FoxNews.com, states that fast-food consumption ...
This article’s main claim is that providing healthy food options in fast food menus allows individuals to perceive the food on the menu overall as healthy; and therefore enhances the likelihood that they will over consume unhealthy food options as well. Downs supports her argument by first providing context and introduces the question why “labels in restaurants do not change behavior”? (429). She finds that “restaurants who have provided nutritional labeling did not change consumer behavior nor did consumers take the opportunity to read them as well” (429). She notes that this critical because fast food has been referred to as one of the reasons behind the rise of obesity in the United States. In addition, she states that her findings about
...s that the processed food is going to waste. “In addition, a growing number of consumers are asking questions about where their food was produced, how it was produced, and who produced it (Hendrickson).”
Daily, millions of people are perusing the grocery store, buying food for their families, completely unaware of what they are purchasing. A study on consumer research regarding food labels by the FDA found only a small percentage of people actually read the food labels and understand what they mean apart from only the calories and fat; ingredients are another story. “According to a study published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, about 61.5 percent reported using the nutrition facts panel when deciding to purchase food. Fewer people paid attention to the list of ingredients” (CNN Health). The FDA is aware that labeling could help reverse the acceleration we are seeing in heart diseases and obesity, but labeling does not help people to read the ingredients if they do not understand pseudonyms, and vitamins. “The surveys also revealed frequent misunderstanding of the meaning of the daily/value column that shows how each nutrient fits into a healthy diet, “(American journal Nutrition, WEB). Many different harmful ingredients are secretly hidden in labels and people skimming ov...
Lastly, there could be a dramatic decrease in people who have food affiliated illnesses. When people know what they are consuming they will know the greater risk of becoming sick. The passage "Label the Meals" says, "Armed with relevant information, consumers can address this risk and be better for it. " Almost half of adults in the United States have diabetes or some other form of health issue. If the nutritional values were shown on the menus for the food about to be consumed, people will be well aware of how much sodium or fat they are ingesting.
Food labels are supposed to tell us exactly what’s in the foods we consume but we don’t know where those things come from. I think that food labels should state exactly where and what companies provided the ingredients in the foods on the food labels. If we knew exactly what we were eating we could prevent each other from getting sick from the foods. The government will never release exactly what we are eating because they’re are gaining too much money when they keep things kept a secret but; too many people are getting sick from these foods we need to be able to prevent ourselves from getting
Social relativism firmly guards/unequivocally communicates that each society has its own particular set of traditions and convictions, and that society must be seen by the principles and estimations of the people inside that society. Individuals who study people feel that things that may seem unfeeling or odd in light of wrong thinking in our own particular society must be seen through the viewpoint of social relativity, and that all societies have practices or convictions that can be seen by others as sickening or extremely confounding. Getting used to how people act in a society is a procedure in which parts of one social gathering receives the convictions and practices of an alternate gathering. getting used to how people act in a society is generally toward a minority gathering putting into use propensities and dialect examples of the most in control gathering, getting used to how people act in a society can be two-way that is, the most in control amass likewise receives examples like the minority bunch. Mixing in of one social gathering into an alternate may be indicated/demonstrated valid by changes in dialect inclination, choice of normal demeanor and qualities, enrollment in like manner social gatherings and establishments, and loss of partitioned political or identified with a gathering of people with the same race, society, religion, and so forth identification.