What if there was a legal fast-food-eating age?

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It would help with obesity. Six years old might be a good age. Unfortunately, it would also be kind of controlling.

Then everyone would need ID

Outside of school, minors usually don't need ID, except driving

Usually

The Big Food would lose $$$$

Adults could still buy fast food for children



Fast food is cheaper than nutritious

Children usually don't have much $$$$

Adults usually have more $$$ than kids

Usually





Making fast food more expensive, could be "discrimination". Classism

I don’t think that fast food itself is the problem, but it’s the amount that people choose to eat. When I make cheeseburgers at home, they’re much larger and more fattening (and more delicious!) than fast food burgers.

Maybe there should be a limit to how much one can buy. I saw this extremely obese guy the other day eat two large value meals. It would be hard to implement a restriction like this, though. People should have the right to make pigs of themselves, I suppose.

A hospital that I go to for appointments doesn’t sell soda with sugar in it anymore. I think it’s a good idea. I worry when I see a person with diabetes drinking a huge cup of sugary soda.

Rationing? What ... are we at war? Don't you know that this is how black markets get started?

I don't believe in limiting the rights of people to eat any food they want.

There should be education, however, in what the "bad" foods are.

Michael Bloomberg, the Mayor of New York previous to DeBlasio, tried to impose a ban on "sugary drinks" a few years ago; that wasn't received too well. It certainly wasn't well-received by myself (who drinks diet drinks).

Such measures never work. Educating people about food - including nutritional value, actual necessary caloric intake (many are shocked to discover once starting to count calories how much they actually overeat), teaching kids to cook and having easier access and non-prohibitive prices for quality fresh ingredients helps a lot more.

But that takes money, effort and patience so it won't become that popular any time soon

You're right----it's quite expensive, these days, to "eat well."

I am not one of those who eats that great, by the way. I have lots of fried foods, and such.

Junk food is cheap because it is filled with cheap ingredients. Take Ramen-style noodles, for example, there is a direct correlation between affordability and sodium content -- the cheaper it is, the more sodium it has.

Dietary fiber (cellulose), salt, soy, sugar and starch are the main 'fillers' in junk food. Fast food may include these, and also 'pink slime' or 'meat by-products' -- essentially those last few bits of muscle that stick to the bone of slaughtered animals.

Cereals tend to be "fortified" with varying amounts of vitamins and minerals. Something like "Product 19" is fortified with 100% of the "recommended daily allowance" of many vitamins and minerals.