Introduction
With the cost of living rising, more Americans have more than one job and as a result, they have less time to eat or even prepare a decent meal. Most of them operate under tight schedules moving from one job to the other as they try to cope with the economic hardships.
As a result, more and more Americans (from children to adults) are now taking fast foods which are not healthy and this has led to complains that Americans are becoming fatter and fatter as years move on.
As a result, health conscious people have been advocating for the government to regulate the food business an issue which has faced both support and opposition from different sectors. The question which rings in many discussions are “Should the government regulate the food industry”?
From my own opinion, I don’t think it would be advisable for the government to regulate the food business. Americans live in a free land where they are free to choose what to do as long as it does not harm other citizens. If someone chooses to visit a fast food joint to go and take his or her food, eat and then go to work, where is the problem there?
The individual does not have the time to go and prepare a decent meal since as the cost of living rise, many citizens have opted to multiple jobs in an effort to save and also pay their debts. May be if he had enough time he could have taken or prepared a decent meal.
As long as the government advises its citizens on the advantages of taking decent balanced meal, what ever they choose to take should be their own problem. They won’t become obese because they were forced to eat from a fast food they will become obese because it was their choice to eat from the fast food joint.
It’s their freedom and whatever happens to their bodies should be left for them to live with the consequences. Take for example of a person who works in four different jobs in a single day with the breaks from one to the other just being enough to allow them move from where they are working to the next.
What will make them not pass through a fast food joint and take something to eat before they can reach the other place of work? If the government regulates the food industry will this person not either lose the job by being a routine late comer and if he doest take the food will his productivity not go below the expected levels due to hunger resulting in losses or even being fired.
On the other hand, the US is a recognized capitalist country which allows markets to rule themselves freely without any government interference. The fast food is a big industry in the country and if there is nothing unhealthy that the industry is practicing, the government should then allow the theory of Laissez Faire to take control of the market.
The consumer is always right and knows what he or she wants to take and if it is their choice to take fast food, why should the government be concerned. What makes the government think that the consumer does not know the consequences of eating the food, don’t people smoke with the health warning on the packet staring in their eyes and informing them that smoking kills?
It is for the companies to decide either to make healthier foods but not for the government to interfere with their businesses. Let the markets rule themselves otherwise if the government regulates the food industry, some people will go jobless.
Conclusion
Whether the government should regulate the food industry or should not is an issue of discussion but from above we can conclude that the government should not regulate the food industry as in doing so it would be interfering with the lives of its free and independent citizens who have chosen fast food as their way of life.
Government interference with the food industry could lead to unemployment of its own citizens thus regulation by the government should be avoided and people should be allowed to choose what they eat no matter the consequences. It is their bodies and they know what they are doing.