4 ms·

A 12 oz can of Coca Cola has twice the sugar content of an apple, without the beneficial fiber or vitamins. How many Americans are obese because they eat too m

A 12 oz can of Coca Cola has twice the sugar content of an apple, without the beneficial fiber or vitamins. How many Americans are obese because they eat too many fruits and vegetables? An overwhelming majority are obese due to fast foods, soda, snacks, and sweets... costing taxpayers millions of dollars while companies profit from the negative externality.

sddfd 9y ago
I absolutely share your viewpoint. As a consumer, I try to think about the ingredients of a product: if it is mostly chemicals (in contrast do agricultural products), then the product probably isn't healthy.
- abiox 9y ago
  well, consider that basically everything is constituted by chemical compounds (an apple contains stuff like epicatechin, phloridzin, quercetin, etc.)
- KozmoNau7 9y ago
  https://cdn.paperpile.com/blog/files/Goldberg-2014.pdf https://cdn.paperpile.com/blog/files/Goldberg-2014.pdf The "chemicals are bad!" scare has gotten completely out of hand.
  - sddfd 9y ago
    I'm not at all against chemical additives. I'm just saying if you're eating something which barely contains any agricultural product, you should ask yourself whether this is really healthy.
microcolonel 9y ago
> costing taxpayers millions of dollars How do you mean? My understanding is that it would affect insurance rates for the overweight, unless of course insurers are not allowed to set rates based on bodyfat guidelines? I'd accept that it's costly here in Canada though, definitely an increase in emergency medical service load.
- mikeash 9y ago
  About one third of Americans receive government-funded health care, mostly through Medicare and Medicaid. Additionally, when uninsured people visit the emergency room and can't pay for the service, the ER is not allowed to turn them away, and the rest of us end up paying for it.
- adameast9000 9y ago
  regardless of rates, it puts a strain on the healthcare system
BeetleB 9y ago
While I don't necessarily agree with GP, and don't disagree with you, I feel compelled to point out that your comment is almost orthogonal to his. Your points have little to do with what the GP wrote about.
pygy_ 9y ago
How is the food industry supposed to grow if we stop becoming more and more obese?
- quickthrower2 9y ago
  If we eat better food that is more sustainable the food industry will do well. You replace the giant producers with lots of small farms. People pay more for food per calorie, but balanced out by fewer calories. The food mafia won't like this though so they'll lobby for laws to avoid it.
  - pygy_ 9y ago
    I'm actually in the process of founding a small farm :-) I tend to conflate the food industry with the food mafia though, and I'm highly skeptical of the long term prospects of civilization if we pursue our growth-based economy. Resources on earth are finite, efficiency can't rise past (or approach) 100%, and the amount of entropy we generate today is already too high for the rest of the biosphere, leading to its collapse.
- richardknop 9y ago
  By focusing on healthy food with higher margin. That could cause people to eat less and be thinner and food companies would keep their revenues because margin would be higher (think free range eggs, chicken that lived outside in good conditions instead of horrible food factories where they are treated horribly).
  - pygy_ 9y ago
    I actually hope we get there :-) but it would mean that people would have to spend a higher share of their income on food. When it comes to stripping people of their cash, the competition is fierce, and we humans are usually not very good at long term thinking. Guilt- and shame-based marketing is not very effective (boasting health/societal benefits is indirectly guilt tripping people), less than hey look at this shiny $product that would make you sooo cool among your peers. Shiny! Buy now! And don't get me started on addiction-based products, like junk food (or screen-based products, be them games or serial TV shows).
test6554 9y ago
Where I come from, if a person buys and eats junk and gets obese, that's their own fault, not the fault of the person who sells junk, and certainly not the fault of taxpayers. Their additional costs should come out of their own pockets.
- NegativeLatency 9y ago
  What about the gov subsidies of corn that got us to the current situation?
- kunimu 9y ago
  I think there's certainly an argument to be made for social health care, the restriction of that health care for certain illnesses, and limiting the ability or capacity of companies to knowingly and deliberately entrap people into a cycle of sugar "addiction". Of course they are only offering goods to sell, but the effects of this simplified reductionist view are seen through society and deserve to be studied and inspected.
- s73ver_ 9y ago
  That's an extremely short sighted way to look at things, which gives a complete pass to a bunch of bad actors in the system. Why is it always "personal responsibility", but never "corporate responsibility"?
- losteric 9y ago
  We should tax the companies that profit to fund public education on these issues... If the public is not aware of the risks, they cannot be at fault because they never made a decision.
NegativeLatency 9y ago
The fiber is really important because it slows the rate of blood sugar change, and makes you feel full. I could easily drink 2 cans of pop, but could not eat 4 apples.
alphaalpha101 9y ago
So it's not sugar that causes cancer then, is it? It's obesity. Does sugar cause cancer if you control for obesity?

sddfd 9y ago

I absolutely share your viewpoint. As a consumer, I try to think about the ingredients of a product: if it is mostly chemicals (in contrast do agricultural products), then the product probably isn't healthy.

abiox 9y ago
well, consider that basically everything is constituted by chemical compounds (an apple contains stuff like epicatechin, phloridzin, quercetin, etc.)
KozmoNau7 9y ago
https://cdn.paperpile.com/blog/files/Goldberg-2014.pdf https://cdn.paperpile.com/blog/files/Goldberg-2014.pdf The "chemicals are bad!" scare has gotten completely out of hand.
- sddfd 9y ago
  I'm not at all against chemical additives. I'm just saying if you're eating something which barely contains any agricultural product, you should ask yourself whether this is really healthy.

microcolonel 9y ago

> costing taxpayers millions of dollars How do you mean? My understanding is that it would affect insurance rates for the overweight, unless of course insurers are not allowed to set rates based on bodyfat guidelines? I'd accept that it's costly here in Canada though, definitely an increase in emergency medical service load.

mikeash 9y ago
About one third of Americans receive government-funded health care, mostly through Medicare and Medicaid. Additionally, when uninsured people visit the emergency room and can't pay for the service, the ER is not allowed to turn them away, and the rest of us end up paying for it.
adameast9000 9y ago
regardless of rates, it puts a strain on the healthcare system

BeetleB 9y ago

While I don't necessarily agree with GP, and don't disagree with you, I feel compelled to point out that your comment is almost orthogonal to his. Your points have little to do with what the GP wrote about.

pygy_ 9y ago

How is the food industry supposed to grow if we stop becoming more and more obese?

quickthrower2 9y ago
If we eat better food that is more sustainable the food industry will do well. You replace the giant producers with lots of small farms. People pay more for food per calorie, but balanced out by fewer calories. The food mafia won't like this though so they'll lobby for laws to avoid it.
- pygy_ 9y ago
  I'm actually in the process of founding a small farm :-) I tend to conflate the food industry with the food mafia though, and I'm highly skeptical of the long term prospects of civilization if we pursue our growth-based economy. Resources on earth are finite, efficiency can't rise past (or approach) 100%, and the amount of entropy we generate today is already too high for the rest of the biosphere, leading to its collapse.
richardknop 9y ago
By focusing on healthy food with higher margin. That could cause people to eat less and be thinner and food companies would keep their revenues because margin would be higher (think free range eggs, chicken that lived outside in good conditions instead of horrible food factories where they are treated horribly).
- pygy_ 9y ago
  I actually hope we get there :-) but it would mean that people would have to spend a higher share of their income on food. When it comes to stripping people of their cash, the competition is fierce, and we humans are usually not very good at long term thinking. Guilt- and shame-based marketing is not very effective (boasting health/societal benefits is indirectly guilt tripping people), less than hey look at this shiny $product that would make you sooo cool among your peers. Shiny! Buy now! And don't get me started on addiction-based products, like junk food (or screen-based products, be them games or serial TV shows).

test6554 9y ago

Where I come from, if a person buys and eats junk and gets obese, that's their own fault, not the fault of the person who sells junk, and certainly not the fault of taxpayers. Their additional costs should come out of their own pockets.

NegativeLatency 9y ago
What about the gov subsidies of corn that got us to the current situation?
kunimu 9y ago
I think there's certainly an argument to be made for social health care, the restriction of that health care for certain illnesses, and limiting the ability or capacity of companies to knowingly and deliberately entrap people into a cycle of sugar "addiction". Of course they are only offering goods to sell, but the effects of this simplified reductionist view are seen through society and deserve to be studied and inspected.
s73ver_ 9y ago
That's an extremely short sighted way to look at things, which gives a complete pass to a bunch of bad actors in the system. Why is it always "personal responsibility", but never "corporate responsibility"?
losteric 9y ago
We should tax the companies that profit to fund public education on these issues... If the public is not aware of the risks, they cannot be at fault because they never made a decision.

NegativeLatency 9y ago

The fiber is really important because it slows the rate of blood sugar change, and makes you feel full. I could easily drink 2 cans of pop, but could not eat 4 apples.

alphaalpha101 9y ago

So it's not sugar that causes cancer then, is it? It's obesity. Does sugar cause cancer if you control for obesity?