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| No | 50% | 1157 votes | Total: 2297 votes | |
| Yes | 50% | 1140 votes |
No
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Add to FavoritesSince the only way to require restaurants to list calorie and fat gram information on their menus would be through government regulation, I do not feel it is necessary. After all, no one has to eat at any particular restaurant, or to eat at restaurants at all. Increased government regulation in this area would require unnecessary expenditures by a government that is already running in so much debt it will probably never get out, as well as placing an undue burden on restaurants to comply.
On the other hand, I do feel that in the current climate of increased health consciousness restaurants should be voluntarily offering nutrition information such as calorie and fat gram content for the food they serve.
This is actually already happening and does not require government intervention. As consumers demand the information and begin trying to make healthier choices, free trade and capitalism are driving the changes naturally. Large chains such as McDonald's, which has been criticized in the past for it's high calorie and high fat menu items, have already begun offering nutrition information on their website and by request inside the restaurants. They have also begun to slowly add healthier options to their menu such as fresh apple slices.
Based on their success with these healthier menu options, other restaurants have followed suit so they don't miss out on their share of consumer spending. Burger King's recent addition of apple fries, apples cut to resemble French fries, is an example. Other fast food chains are certain to follow suit.
It comes down to individual responsibility and the laws of supply and demand. If consumers avoid the fat and calorie laden choices and demand healthier alternatives, the restaurants will provide them. They are in business to provide food that people will buy. So, during the years when we continued to blindly buy the burgers and fries with no regard to our health, they were more than happy to continue selling billions and billions of them. Now that we have begun to place a higher value on our health and have begun demanding better options, they've begun to provide them. That's how the free market system works.
If your favorite restaurant doesn't offer nutrition information, you have several options. First, I would suggest asking them. Perhaps it's already available by request and you simply weren't aware of it. Or, if it's not, you may be one of many people who have asked and actually spur them on to provide the information. Your other options include doing a little research on your own. There are numerous books and calorie guides available that give nutrition information on a wide variety of foods, including foods found in many popular restaurants. And, there's always the internet. With information at our fingertips and more easily accessible than ever before, there's not much excuse for not knowing something other than simply being too lazy to find out.
One radical idea that many people seem to not even consider anymore is this: if you don't like the fatty foods to a particular restaurant is serving, simply stop going to that restaurant. Many people act as if there is some secret, hidden force that pulls them like a magnet through a drive-through and forces them to order and eat something bad for them. No amount of government regulation can save those people from the fact that they are simply unwilling to take responsibility for themselves and what they are putting into their bodies.
Learn more about this author, Bruce W. Coffman.
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Yes
Yes definitely. I've thought about this for years, if McDonald's can do it, why can't everyone else?
As a person who reads every ingredient of every label of every product I pick up from the shelf, I would love to be able to read a menu in a restaurant, and see, straight away, the ingredients of every dish, and the nutritional information.
I don't understand why its demanded of any brand that sells any food product that goes into a supermarket to have detailed nutritional information on the packaging, but not of restaurants. They are still serving food aren't they? We are going to consume that food, and that food may have a damaging effect on our health, so shouldn't we have that information printed in black and white for us?
McDonald's has a reputation of selling us "bad food", but they show us nutritional information. They know that most of their food is high in calories, fat and salt, but they still show us. Why? So that they can say that each customers decision to eat in their establishment was their own informed choice.
If we get this from a food chain, where most of us eat the food on the go, why can't we get it from a restaurant, where we will sit with our friends and families, spend a good amount of time there, gorging ourselves, usually on far more food than we ever would in McDonald's.
For a lot of people going out for dinner to a restaurant is a treat, something that isn't done a lot, for some others, eating out is a regular occurance in their lives. No matter which bracket you fall into, I think everyone has a right to fully know what they are eating.
If you went into your favourite restaurant tomorrow, sat down, made yourself comfortable, looked at the menu, and noticed that the meal that you usually have contains over half the calories, fat, salt etc intended for the day, would you still order it? Perhaps, you would. But most likely, you would take a good long look at that menu and look for something that is the healthier option!
Having nutritional information on all food that we eat, no matter where we eat it, is no bad thing. It might lead to people asking for smaller size portions, salad without the dressing, sharing desserts, or going without, and would that really be so horrible? People being informed of what they are putting into their bodies? Helping themselves have a healthier diet?
No nutrional information on food equals kidding yourself into what it really contains. A slice of cheese cake delivered to your table, a small slice, will only contain ,at the most, two hundred calories. That's in your head of course! that little slice of cheese cake probably contains nearer to the five hundred calorie mark! If you had seen that on the menu, might you have gone for the fruit salad or the sorbet? I know I certainly would.
Learn more about this author, Anna Maria Ryan.
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