> Don't believe me? Restaurants are now voluntarily adding calorie numbers to menus, because the lower calorie stuff is higher margin and people buy it.
Actually, if you are in California then it's more likely because of a 2009 law[1]:
"Putting our heads in the gastronomic sand became a bit harder starting July 1, 2009, when a new law went into effect making California the first state to mandate that chain restaurants--those with 20 or more locations--provide a calorie count for everything on the menu."
I moved from Texas to California and I can confirm that, while there does seem to be a trend toward more and more restaurants voluntarily including this information, you don't really SEE it until you cross the border into California.
This is an example of a business regulation that has had a directly positive impact on my daily food choices... I find that I automatically choose lower calorie foods just because the calorie numbers guilt me into doing so. In fact, this one thing led to a general softening of my hard-core libertarian "no regulations ever let the market decide" stance of the past.
Yeah, I have to say I really appreciate this as well. It's especially eye opening to go into a movie theater and see the large popcorn labelled as 1500 calories (!!!).
Actually, if you are in California then it's more likely because of a 2009 law[1]:
"Putting our heads in the gastronomic sand became a bit harder starting July 1, 2009, when a new law went into effect making California the first state to mandate that chain restaurants--those with 20 or more locations--provide a calorie count for everything on the menu."
[1] http://www.examiner.com/article/calorie-count-california-res...