Should restaurants be required to list nutrition information?

Since 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 that 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.

Many of my blog post ideas come from articles I've written at Helium.com. Click below to read more of my articles on Helium: