The "Affordable" Care Act Will Now Make Your Food Less Affordable
Your food will be less affordable and you'll have less choice thanks to the Obamacare regulation mandating calorie counts be posted (at chain restaurants, bakeries, cafeterias, coffee shops, convenience stores, delis, food service facilities in entertainment venues, takeout places like pizzerias, and in grocery stores, retail sweet shops, and superstores).

This is very important to do because so many people are under the impression that chocolate covered pretzels are made of kale and have only 2 calories each. This is obviously why they buy them or that Supersized Slurpee -- because they are too stupid to understand that these items are junk food.

Julie Gonlock writes at NRO that this Obamacare calorie-labeling mandate is costly and does not improve our health:

The modern supermarket is truly amazing. These stores stock just about everything: food of every variety, some hardware items, cleaning supplies, shampoos and soaps, cards and office supplies. As a mom of three young kids, I appreciate that I can often buy everything on my long list in just one stop. Many people appreciate the ready-to-eat section of the supermarket because they enjoy the convenience of grabbing a rotisserie chicken or a prepared meal that can be warmed up and eaten at home, thereby avoiding the extra cost of being served in a restaurant.

Yet, this is exactly the part of the store that will be most affected by the new FDA regulations, despite the very real (and quite obvious) differences between it and a restaurant. The most obvious difference is that supermarket ready-to-eat counters don't have menus, because their offerings change day to day.

I know this firsthand because I once worked in the deli of a supermarket. When the deli manager (let's call her Marge) needed to fill the display case with a few more items, she would send me to the produce section, where the produce manager would give me a variety of very ripe fruits and vegetables -- things that could no longer be sold as such, but were still perfectly fine for use chopped in a salad of some sort.

Marge and I would then put together some salads and other items that would be sold in single-serving containers. There were no recipes for these things. We just knew how to throw a few items together and make something that tasted good. It was a win for the store because it led to less waste and less monetary loss. It was also a win for the customers who liked these seasonal items, which also tended to be healthy.

Enter the menu-labeling regulations, and this perfect little ecosystem goes straight to hell.

First, the regulation will kill innovation. Since Marge doesn't know how many calories are in each serving of her thrown-together salads, she'll be forced to stop making them. Her boss certainly isn't going to spend money getting each of those creations analyzed for their calories, fat, salt, and sugar (and with sugar, one would need to know what percentage occurs naturally and what percentage is added) because Marge might not have those exact ingredients available to her next week, meaning she would be making all new salads.

So, because of this law, Marge will stop making her impromptu salads. She'll be required to follow a set recipe so that the store can post exact and accurate information about calories, fat, sugar, and salt. Never mind that this will mean fewer choices for shoppers (especially fewer vegetable and fruit choices) and more wasted produce. The government thinks Marge and her staff are better off sticking to salads that can be clearly labeled. And apparently it thinks you'll be better off, too.

Of course, these regulations capture more than just the salads and the many other items sold in the deli. The bakery would also be affected. So much for that specialty cake you wanted to order for little Timmy's birthday party. You'll have to choose from these four appropriately labeled cakes.

Food writers, most of whom will cheer for these regulations, often preach about going back to a simpler time when good people cooked with love for their customers. Yet, they don't seem to recognize that that's exactly what Marge (and many just like her) was doing before the FDA got in there and messed it all up.

Most depressingly, study after study shows that these new regulations will do next to nothing in terms of encouraging Americans to cut calories and eat healthier.

I like what a commenter, Palamas, said at NRO:

When was the Constitution changed to give you a right to know how many calories there are in the handmade salad you are thinking of ordering?

via @walterolson