[orangecat]

There can only be one explanation: most consumers are dumb.

Or other people have different tradeoffs between short-term pleasure and statistical long-term health. You can define that as "stupid" if you want, but I'm guessing there are plenty of things that you do because you enjoy them that you would not do if maximizing health were your sole priority.

[ewzimm]

Nothing beats being healthy, which is why I'm not one of these idiots who doesn't read labels. I've put in the work to optimize my purchasing habits, so I know that the average grocery store contains about 38,718 items. It only takes me around 15 seconds to skim a label for nutritional content and add a mental note of it's contribution to my dietary needs, so I can finish shopping in a new store in just over 161 hours. I have a special exercise routine I do during that time to maximize the experience.

[em3rgent0rdr]

You only have to read every label in the store if you want to make the optimal decision. But a healty diet can still be achieved by only reading labels of products you are most interested in, but not purchasing the unhealthy ones.

[ewzimm]

You're right, of course, but I have to do something to break up all the time I spend reading EULAs and terms of service for all the websites I visit.

[ghock]

I think this "stupid" and choice discussion that comes up quite often for this subject is somewhat of a distraction. There's plenty of people who eat relativly healthy not because they are "smart" about it, but because that's how they grew up. They are just "dumb" in the right direction. I doubt people were more knowledgeable about food when everyone smoked and there was lead in everything.