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Freedom Fries Under Attack
The Los Angeles council has just passed on ordinance banning new fast food restaurants in a poor section of South/Central LA. William Saletan calls it Food Apartheid and writes:
We're not talking anymore about preaching diet and exercise, disclosing calorie counts, or restricting sodas in schools. We're talking about banning the sale of food to adults....It's true that food options in low-income neighborhoods are, on average, worse than the options in wealthier neighborhoods. But restricting options in low-income neighborhoods is a disturbingly paternalistic way of solving the problem.
Milton Friedman once said:
I don't think the state has any more right to tell me what what to put in my mouth than it has to tell me what can come out of my mouth.
Friedman was talking about drug prohibition but today the target could just as easily be food prohibition.
Hat tip on the Friedman quote to Don Boudreaux at Cafe Hayek.
Posted by Alex Tabarrok on August 1, 2008 at 07:10 AM in Economics, Food and Drink | Permalink
Comments
When french fries are outlawed, only outlaws will have french fries....
Posted by: chug at Aug 1, 2008 8:13:03 AM
Great post. Thanks.
Posted by: Daniel Klein at Aug 1, 2008 8:17:48 AM
Amazing how complete control over a person's most basic daily functions us preferable to doing anything to move society towards a better understanding of their own health.
Posted by: Rebecca at Aug 1, 2008 8:34:46 AM
No new fast food restaurants opening isn't as draconian as some are making it out to be. It is however as silly as others are making it out to be. It isn't as though sit down restaurants are so much healthier than fast food.
Posted by: Michael Foody at Aug 1, 2008 8:46:44 AM
This is land use regulation - meaning if there are already lots of fast food places, there should not be more land zoned/permitted for that use. Once we get rid of gated communities, I might buy into the idea of absolute immunity for all from land use regulation. I am not holding my breath.
Posted by: cfw at Aug 1, 2008 9:22:40 AM
If this is really about health it's pretty dumb. They'd be better off making LA more bike friendly, and thus give everyone the option of a ride with their fries.
Posted by: odograph at Aug 1, 2008 9:38:23 AM
More tyranny from the left!
Posted by: Jay at Aug 1, 2008 9:46:27 AM
The food ordinance doesn't apply to current restaurants, who now get the benefit of monopoly pricing in these neighbourhoods.
Posted by: kurt at Aug 1, 2008 10:10:11 AM
How do the define fast food legally? What about Subway, or JambaJuice, or some other semi-healthy place?
Posted by: josh at Aug 1, 2008 10:19:02 AM
Whenever confronted by a measure such as this, I feel a strong aversion to it, but I can never muster an argument against it that I think will be compelling. All that I can usually say is that the government should not be commanding such things because I don't want it to run my life, but this feels feeble to me in comparison to rejoinders that it might improve health and that it will correct bad behaviors that the people want to overcome but cannot (such as those who welcomed smoking bans as forcing them to at last quit smoking). As much as I prefer it, that we should be freer even if we are in worse in some ways seems almost petty in comparison to people being better as the sacrifice of a trivial liberty.
Certainly it seems unlikely to succeed, but I am not sure quite how to demonstrate that convincingly.
(I'm rather new to more-or-less libertarianism, so there are some severe lacunae in my understanding of its propositions)
---------------------------------
Could you, cfw, please explain the tie between gated communities and land use regulation more thoroughly? I know little of them, but am intrigued by your statement which my ignorance presently renders incomprehensible to me.
Posted by: Paludicola at Aug 1, 2008 10:22:58 AM
Yeah, seems like banning transfats would be a better use of their laws.
Posted by: d at Aug 1, 2008 10:25:07 AM
Garbage in, garbage out
Its amazing how seriously some of you take the actions of city councils. As though the council members are anything more than small potatoes public servants fully capable of crafting HORRIFICALLY ineffective public policy.
I dont see why this law warrants any real response other than STUPID PEOPLE THINK AND ACT IN VERY STUPID WAYS.
Posted by: John Pertz at Aug 1, 2008 10:30:28 AM
What does this portend for innovation in the food industry? Shouldn't we expect profit-seeking individuals and businesses to develop new, legal forms of crap, only slightly more suitable for human consumption than "fast food"? As a local down here, I'm excited to see what sort of refuse is concocted to fill the void.
Posted by: Scott at Aug 1, 2008 10:47:08 AM
w/regards to the banning of trans-fats: Listen, you've already taken all the love and enjoyment out of oreos and chips ahoy (they've become stiff, crumbly, and barely edible). Must you destroy the rest of what is good and tasty on the planet?
Posted by: Scott at Aug 1, 2008 10:50:16 AM
This is just a zoning regulation to restrict new fast food restaurants in an area that already has many. Fast food restaurants have a bunch of local externalities. Some believe the "toxic environment" of ubiquitous fast food restaurants injures health. If you don't agree, fine, but at some point even the more obvious blight of signage and parking lots would merit zoning. No wealthy residential neighborhood would tolerate the concentration of fast food restaurants you can find in many low-income urban neighborhoods. Saletan's cavalier use of the term "apartheid" is unnecessarily shrill, and if you think about it, the analogy doesn't work.
Posted by: Parke at Aug 1, 2008 10:53:50 AM
And would we all scorn a decision to ban more liquor stores in a given area? (Seems to me that used to be a hot topic in DC, maybe 35 years ago or so.)
Posted by: Bill Harshaw at Aug 1, 2008 10:57:55 AM
Potential unintended consequences:
1. People will drive farther to buy fast food, thus using more petrol on the way and causing environmental damage.
2A. Rich people will get upset about poor people having to drive into their neighbourhoods for fast food.
2B. More fast food restaurants in rich neighbourhoods will lower property values.
Posted by: anon at Aug 1, 2008 10:59:04 AM
I wonder if the existing fastfood restaurant supported the concil on this.
Posted by: floccina at Aug 1, 2008 11:01:48 AM
I wonder what will happen once McDonalds and BK and the rest start offering full service (but still crappy service via crackheads) restaurants in the area in question?
Also, Micheal Foody is right, sit down restaurants aren't any healthier, especially at low price points which are presumably the closest substitute. Anyone who has ever eaten at a greasy spoon (i.e a diner) knows how ludicrous this legislation is even on its alleged merits.
As a resident of LA, I am also pretty confident that this will boost sales of illegally made street food such as "bacon dogs" by vendors who likely never passed a food sanitation course, and who cook the food as well as handle the unsanitary money used to pay for it, amongst other unclean practices. (The dopes who cook at fast food places haven't passed those courses either, but they must have someone present who has).
Posted by: happyjuggler0 at Aug 1, 2008 11:03:45 AM
BTW there is not eveidence that fast food is un-healthy.
Posted by: floccina at Aug 1, 2008 11:07:23 AM
Seriously guys?
1. "Trivial freedoms." There are no such thing. If you allow your government to take away one freedom, who are you to complain when they take another? And another?
2. What's healthier, eating McDonald's food, or not eating? The reason there is such a proliferation of these restaurants in poor neighborhoods is, the food is cheap and filling. You can get an entire meal for $6, whereas just a sandwich and a "nicer" fast food place like Cosi costs $10. Poor people can't afford that. This measure won't improve health. But it just might increase the rate of starvation.
3. The monopoly pricing issue has already been addressed.
4. And finally, the lack of fast food restaurants in wealthy neighborhoods has little to do with "tolerance" and much to do with preferences. Few people would rather eat McDonald's than say a nicer chain such a Ruth's Chris. Rich people have the means to choose Ruth's Chris with little detriment to their finances and thus McDonald's in their neighborhoods are not profitable. But in a place where people need cheap food, McDonald's helps them get some kind of nourishment they can afford, and they help McDonald's turn a profit.
- This ordinance, like many others in the past (rent control, minimum wage, price ceilings...) does nothing but harm the constituents it is purported to help.
Posted by: David at Aug 1, 2008 11:08:37 AM
No wealthy residential neighborhood would tolerate the concentration of fast food restaurants you can find in many low-income urban neighborhoods
Sigh. There is always someone who thinks that the reason that rich neighborhoods don't have businesses that are "trashy" is due to zoning. Wrong. It is due to a combination of high rent and lack of local demand.
It is laughable to think that a rich neighborhood could profitably support a large concentration of fast food restaurants.
Posted by: happyjuggler0 at Aug 1, 2008 11:09:29 AM
David more eloquently explained my last point better than I did. If only he had posted a couple of minutes earlier....
Posted by: happyjuggler0 at Aug 1, 2008 11:12:28 AM
William Saletan calls it Food Apartheid
No he didn't. I've seen this claim on several different websites now, and it's testament to the fact that people don't read their own links very carefully.
I don't think the state has any more right to tell me what what to put in my mouth than it has to tell me what can come out of my mouth.
Actually, this is a zoning issue. No one made the sale or purchase of fast food illegal.
BTW there is not eveidence that fast food is un-healthy.
For one, see this freakon paper (PDF), which links random local availability of fast food with obesity.
Posted by: Jason Malloy at Aug 1, 2008 11:28:44 AM
Although there don't appear to be any within its city limits, there are about 15 McDonalds, a half-dozen Burger Kings and an equal number of Taco Bells within a 5-mile radius of exclusive (and expensive) Beverly Hills. The rich, like the poor, do support a large concentration of fast food restaurants, as long as that concentration is not too close for comfort.
Posted by: RW Rogers at Aug 1, 2008 11:36:33 AM
