In Poor Neighborhoods, People still Gorge on Fast Food Calories
You remember that documentary don't you, about how fast food outlets like McDonald's, in poor neighborhoods, often cause a great deal of obesity among residents in those areas? Basically, poor people have little choice, but to go to the restaurants that are around, and are cheap. When unhealthy fat-filled $1 hamburgers are all they get, they gorge on them, and end up with such massive quantities of fast food calories you would not believe. Actually it wasn't just any one documentary; a few years ago, this was a hot button topic, and there were plenty of reports that went into this problem. New York's City Council swung into action, and brought down a heavy-handed calorie labeling law that it expected would help end the problem. As it turned out, said a report released a couple of months ago, that action had really no discernible effect; New York's poor still had the same amount of fast food calories in their diet in the rundown neighborhoods. But the city disagrees - and reports that at McDonald's, KFC, and other such outlets across the city, people are seen to order fewer calories. Why doesn't the city agree with that independent report?
The independent report actually says that at places like the Subway chain, a cheap five-dollar offer on foot-longs has them flying out the door, and raising the unhealth index around the city. Actually, the City was cheating; while the independent study looked at what happened in poor neighborhoods, the city has been trying to look at what happens in the rich neighborhoods, mainly. Of course the neighborhoods with better access to healthier foods, would try those. There's hardly anything of intellectual worth in the City's report. The middle class, is going to be able to pay a premium on healthier low calorie food. The poor just tend to buy whatever comes in at under a dollar. And fast food calories tend to really add up in that price range.
But any way you look at it, New York certainly was the first city in the country to ask restaurants to post the energy content next to the prices of orders. Everyone else came after. Most states in the country still haven't caught up. The City tries to put a good face on it any way it can; for instance, they report that the fast food calories ordered at coffee shops are down 10%. How much the city can take credit for this is kind of up in the air, as customers at coffee shops pay no attention to calorie labeling. Only about one in ten customers actually even knows that they need to pay attention to this. However, one in ten isn't that bad. Food habits are about the hardest to change,and this does make for good start.