Obesity is a problem in this country mainly because a lot of people just don’t want to change their ways. And that’s why we think New York City’s proposed ban on jumbo-sized sugary drinks is a simplistic political statement rather than a solution.
Sure, some people could make more informed choices if government did a better job of mandating ingredient and calorie disclosure for various prepared foods and drinks, and we support those efforts.
But is it really the purview of city government to decide how big your soda can be? We don’t think so.
And we doubt it will make much of a difference. The ban doesn’t nix refills, so anyone who is eating at a fast-food joint could — store policy allowing — just go fill ‘er up again. In the same vein, nothing will stop people from buying two drinks.
But more to our point, if someone is deterred from getting their fill of high-fructose corn syrup from soda, they could just order a piece of apple pie to round out their high-calorie repast.
Banning the sale of sugary soft drinks larger than 16 ounces in places such as restaurants and movie theaters doesn’t take on the difficult problem of persuading people to lead healthier lifestyles. It’s more of an annoyance than anything else.
The other thing that chaps us about the proposed ban on larger than 16-ounce drinks is that it has an air of classism to it.
A 2009 report done by the administration of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg decried city residents’ consumption of sugary drinks. It found that residents of economically disadvantaged neighborhoods, such as the South Bronx and Harlem, were more likely to drink non-diet soda and think it was the norm for young children to drink it too.
It strikes us this measure is about them — the poor people who are downing sugary drinks and giving them to their kids.
It’s not like Bloomberg’s administration is going after the chichi patisserie on the Upper West Side.
Public education is the hard work that needs to be done to convince people to improve their lifestyles.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will, if it survives challenges in the U.S. Supreme Court, require restaurant chains to display calorie counts and nutritional values for their menu items. That’s a positive step that will give people important information they can use to make their own choices.
At the end of the day, the only way to beat back the rising tide of obesity is for individuals to decide they don’t want to be fat, tired and unhealthy.
Giving people information they can use to make healthy changes is an appropriate role for government. Enacting a simplistic and ineffective ban, no matter how many headlines it grabs, is not.
