Category: Economy

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Food Packaging Labels: How to Understand Nutrition Facts to Eat Healthier & Save

For most of recorded history, humans were intimately connected with their food. It was essential to know which plants, animals, and fish were edible, as well as the optimal ways to preserve excess foodstuff for periods of drought and famine. Before the invention of canned food in the early 19th century, people typically grew or purchased fresh vegetables and fruit, butchered live animals and birds, and relied on pickling, salting, smoking, sun drying, and underground cold storage to keep their food from spoiling.

Mass-produced processed food gradually replaced fresh food in American diets after World War II, spurred by massive advertising campaigns. The replacement of processed foods for fresh foods extended and complicated the link between food preparation and consumption, forcing consumers to rely on the processes, skills, and integrity of food producers and processors to provide edible, nutritious products free from harmful substances and bacteria.

Our inability to differentiate safe food from spoiled or dangerous food – a skill past generations had when the link between farm and table was more direct – has led to a reliance on food labels as an indication of safety. Unfortunately, consumers are often confused by the various labels, which can lead them to overpay for food with certain labels and throw out perfectly good food because they think it’s past its “expiration date.”

As with anything, knowledge is power when it comes to food labels. Here’s what you need to know to be an informed and savvy consumer.

Food Safety Regulations

Thanks to the meat-packing abuses exposed in Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” and food industry practices revealed by the Poison Squad of 1902, Congress passed the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 and the Federal Meat Inspection Act, turning the Patent Office’s Agricultural Division into today’s Federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA). In 1938, Congress passed the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, significantly expanding the FDA’s authority.

Food safety in the U.S. is provided by three federal agencies, in addition to each state’s public health agencies:

  • Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition regulates all foods, excluding those within the scope of the FSIS.
  • Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS). This agency within the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) regulates the labeling and packaging of meat, poultry, egg products, and some fish to ensure safety.
  • Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). This agency collects data and investigates instances of foodborne illnesses and outbreaks. It’s especially visible in circumstances such as the 2015 Foster Farms salmonella outbreak and Chipotle Mexican Grill E.coli incident.

Before the passage of the Food Safety Modernization Act in 2011, fresh fruits and vegetables were unregulated, and consumers relied on their ability to distinguish the safety of these foods by appearance, feel, and smell. Most fruits and vegetables are now regulated, but those that are considered “rarely consumed raw” remain unregulated.

How to Read Food Labels

The FDA and FSIS rely heavily on manufacturer labeling to inform buyers about the foods they eat. Though different foods are regulated by different federal agencies, producers, processors, and distributors are required to disclose specific data on labels easily visible to consumers. To ensure compliance, food producers, distributors, and retailers are subject to the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) prohibition against false and deceptive advertising.

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Consumer Price Index (CPI) as a Measure of Inflation – How It’s Used

The Consumer Price Index, or CPI, increasingly affects Americans of all ages, incomes, and location. Yet few citizens understand how it’s calculated, how it’s used, or its strengths and shortcomings.

The CPI is one of the most important figures calculated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). It reflects the rate of inflation that has occurred from one period to another, allowing you to understand why your dollars buy less today than yesterday. The Federal Reserve uses the index to set monetary policy, and Congress considers it when determining cost-of-living adjustments to federal benefits and taxes.

Here’s what you need to know to understand the CPI and how it affects our nation’s economy — and your bottom line.

What Is the CPI?

Simply stated, the Consumer Price Index is a weighted measure of the change in prices paid by typical consumers for a representative collection of goods and services over time. The BLS uses a combination of sampling data and statistical analysis to establish the price for a fixed category of goods and service consumed by a family unit during a specific period. A comparison of the index price for two calendar dates provides a close approximation of inflation between the two periods.

Three separate, though related, Consumer Price Indexes are published each month:

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How Immigration Affects the U.S. Economy – 11 Myths to Dispel


 
Immigration has long been a controversial subject for Americans, despite the country’s reputation as the world’s melting pot. In times of economic uncertainty, emotions run especially high, and partisans on both sides of the political divide use immigration controversy for their own gain.
 
Knowing what’s fact and what’s fiction is particularly tricky in the unregulated, anonymous world of social media. In order to separate the truth from our fears, it’s important to know the facts behind the issues. Here’s how immigration affects several aspects of the U.S. economy.

Immigration Myths

According to the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), there are approximately 45 million immigrants in the United States today, making up about 13.5% of the population. Immigrant children born in the country almost double the figures to 87 million and 27%, respectively. Over 80% of immigrants have lived in the country for more than five years, and almost one in three owns a home.
 
Yet while immigrants are a part of our neighborhoods, schools, and workplaces, misconceptions about them abound. Here are some of the most common.

Myth #1: Most Immigrants Come From Latin America

Many Americans believe that immigrants predominately come from Latin America by sneaking over the border. While Latin Americans accounted for 37.2% of immigrants in 2016, the composition of immigrants has changed significantly in the past half-century. In 1960, the largest immigrant groups were from Italy, Germany, the U.K., and Canada, according to the MPI. European countries accounted for almost one-half (48.5%) of the total, and the Soviet Union (7.1%) had a higher share than Mexico (5.9%).
 
In 2016, most immigrants came from Mexico (26.5%), India (5.6%), and China (4.9%). Mexico and Central American countries, including Cuba, accounted for the largest proportion of legal and illegal immigrants, but not the majority. Asia represented slightly more than 20%, with the rest of the world comprising 42.5%.

Myth #2: Most Immigrants Are Illegal

Some Americans believe most foreigners are in the United States illegally. That is not true. Illegal immigrants account for about 24.5% of the immigrant population but a meager 3.4% of the U.S. population in total, according to Pew Research.

Myth #3: Immigrants Are Unskilled & Uneducated

Some Americans assume immigrants are uneducated, unskilled, low-wage workers. However, the MPI found that one-half of immigrants have a high school diploma or higher education. Two-thirds of immigrants over the age of 16 are employed, with almost a third (31.6%) in management, business, science, and the arts, compared to 38.8% of native-born citizens.
 
It’s true that a higher proportion of immigrants (24.1%) are engaged in low-wage service jobs than native-born citizens (16.8%). However, the libertarian-leaning Cato Institute, citing statistics from the U.S. Office of Homeland Security and others, states that immigrants are “generally much better educated than U.S.-born Americans are … [and] 62 percent more likely than U.S.-born natives to have graduated college.”
 
Foreigners who work in the United States with H-1B visas have bachelor’s degrees or higher and work in specialized fields such as IT, engineering, mathematics, and science. President Trump and others have complained that H-1B visa holders compete with Americans for high-paying jobs. However, the visa program was created to allow companies to hire foreign workers to work for three years or more in specialty occupations for which there are not enough skilled Americans to fill the positions.
 
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Is an Electric Self-Driving Car in Your Future?


 
The growth of automobile ownership in America has provided a mix of blessings and harm to the country and the world. Cars have spurred economic growth, population mobility, and geographic freedom. However, fossil-fueled automobiles are the leading causes of pollution, urban sprawl, and massive traffic delays — in addition to deaths, injuries, and property damage due to accidents.
 
One solution to these problems is the development of electric, self-driving cars. Some analysts project that these vehicles will eliminate traffic accidents, reduce pollution, and decrease the number of vehicles on the road.
 
Is an electric or self-driving car in your future? Here’s a look at what they are, what they offer, and how to determine whether one is right for you.

What Is an Electric or Self-Driving Vehicle?

Technology is on track to transform the relationship between humans, their vehicles, and the environment over the next two decades. Peter O’Connor of the Union of Concerned Scientists predicts that electric vehicles (or EVs) could constitute 20% of U.S. automobile sales by 2025. As sales increase, the cost of EVs will go down. At the same time, the cost of internal combustion engine vehicles will rise as manufacturers face stringent, costly emission regulations.
 
Not all electric cars are self-driving, and not all self-driving cars are electric. While electric vehicles are on the road today, self-driving cars are only in the testing phase, and no one can say for certain when consumers can expect to see them. Here’s a look at the differences between the two.

Electric-Powered Vehicles

Electric vehicles are powered by electricity from batteries or fuel cells located within the body of the vehicle. The first EV was introduced in Scotland and enjoyed a brief popularity as a taxi in the late 19th century. The introduction of the internal combustion engine, coupled with the low cost of gasoline, led to EVs’ replacement by the 1920s.
 
Electric cars are extremely efficient — 95% compared to a traditional combustion engine’s 30% — since they deliver power directly to the wheels, eliminating the need for a clutch or gears. Manufacturers are currently exploring the possibility of an electric engine that would reside entirely within the wheel rim.
 
Concerns about the environment — electric engines produce 0% tailpipe emissions — and the volatility of fuel prices have also stimulated the development of modern electric vehicles. In 1997, Toyota produced the first mass-produced hybrid car, the Prius, which had a small gasoline engine to drive the electric motor between charges. Nissan, Honda, Ford, and Chevrolet followed with their own models within a few years.
 
GM produced the first all-electric vehicle, the EV1, in 1996, but it was never commercially viable. In 2008, Tesla Motors produced its electric Roadster, followed by the launch of the Nissan Leaf. According to EVRater, 65 all-electric vehicles and 63 hybrid vehicles from 27 manufacturers are available now or upcoming. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, almost 725,000 electric or hybrid vehicles were on the road in America in 2017, amounting to about 3% of total U.S. new car sales, according to Quartz.
 
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