Happy Meal Ban: McDonald's Outsmarts San Francisco

[FRISKY]

On Thursday, Dec. 1, the city's de facto ban of the Happy Meal commences. San Francisco has accomplished what the Hamburglar could not. Or has it?

In order to include a toy with a meal, restaurants must now comply with city-generated nutritional standards. Those are standards that even the "healthier" Happy Meals McDonald's introduced earlier this year don't come close to meeting. (As SF Weekly noted in January, the school lunches our children eat aren't healthy enough to qualify, either).

And yet it seems McDonald's has turned lemons into lemonade -- and is selling the sugary drink to San Francisco's children. Local McDonald's employees tell SF Weekly the company has devised a solution that appears to comply with San Francisco's "Healthy Meal Incentive Ordinance" that could actually make the company more money -- and necessitate toy-happy youngsters to buy more Happy Meals.

It turns out San Francisco has not entirely vanquished the Happy Meal as we know it. Come Dec. 1, you can still buy the Happy Meal. But it doesn't come with a toy. For that, you'll have to pay an extra 10 cents.

Huh. That hardly seems to have solved the problem (though adults and children purchasing unhealthy food can at least take solace that the 10 cents is going to Ronald McDonald House charities). But it actually gets worse from here. Thanks to Supervisor Eric Mar's much-ballyhooed new law, parents browbeaten into supplementing their preteens' Happy Meal toy collections are now mandated to buy the Happy Meals.

Today and tomorrow mark the last days that put-upon parents can satiate their youngsters by simply throwing down $2.18 for a Happy Meal toy. But, thanks to the new law taking effect on Dec. 1, this is no longer permitted. Now, in order to have the privilege of making a 10-cent charitable donation in exchange for the toy, you must buy the Happy Meal. Hilariously, it appears Mar et al., in their desire to keep McDonald's from selling grease and fat to kids with the lure of a toy have now actually incentivized the purchase of that grease and fat -- when, beforehand, a put-upon parent could get out cheaper and healthier with just the damn toy.

​Messages for Mar and his legislative aides -- who are, at this moment, in a Board of Supervisors meeting -- have not yet been returned.

In any event, it appears the fast food chain's sharpie lawyers have McTopped San Francisco's legislators. Count this city's lawmakers as the latest among the billions and billions served.

MORE: http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/...alds_outsm.php

[HewenttoJared]

Should have banned toys from restaurants unless their average meal met a certain nutritional standard.

[PennyQuilts]

Restaurants can sell a pony as far as I am concerned. Who wants to live in a country where the government can ban that sort of thing? Some people want to throw away their freedom with both hands - and the freedom of others.

Too bad so many people have decided that people are just too stupid to make their own decisions. In a world where we try to defeat Darwin by wrapping everyone up in cotton, I fear for the future of man. When people are discouraged from thinking for themselves or using their own best judgment, what you end up with are slaves. And slave owners.

[SoonerDave]

Should have banned toys from restaurants unless their average meal met a certain nutritional standard.

Nonsense.

The reality is that *parents* have to stand up and tell their kids "no." These days, many folks suggest that's tantamount to child abuse. Parents are too worried about being buddies, not parents. To think that banning the sale of a hamburger is a solution to ANY of this borders on the insane.

The key is balance and moderation.

I am *stunned* that there is not more fundamental outrage at the idea of a government entity "banning" the sale of a hamburger. I am delighted that McDonalds found a decidedly creative way around this particular kind of nanny-state idiocy. Maybe hamburgers aren't your thing, and that's fine, but one of these days an unchecked government is going to come along and gore *your* ox next, then it won't be nearly so pleasant.

[SoonerDave]

Restaurants can sell a pony as far as I am concerned. Who wants to live in a country where the government can ban that sort of thing? Some people want to throw away their freedom with both hands - and the freedom of others.

Too bad so many people have decided that people are just too stupid to make their own decisions. In a world where we try to defeat Darwin by wrapping everyone up in cotton, I fear for the future of man. When people are discouraged from thinking for themselves or using their own best judgment, what you end up with are slaves. And slave owners.

With the government holding title to everyone.

Very well said, PQ.

[MadMonk]

Hilariously, it appears Mar et al., in their desire to keep McDonald's from selling grease and fat to kids with the lure of a toy have now actually incentivized the purchase of that grease and fat -- when, beforehand, a put-upon parent could get out cheaper and healthier with just the damn toy.

LOL, the law of unintended consequences strikes again! Kudos to McD's for finding a way around this asinine regulation and profiting from it.

[Pete]

As has been proven time and time again, you can't legislate common sense.


Pretty interesting that even the public school lunches in that area don't meet the stated nutritional goals. Maybe that would be a better place to start??

[Maynard]

With the government holding title to everyone.

Very well said, PQ.

"For children we assign responsibility in the first instance to parents. The family, rather than the individual, has always been and remains today the basic building block of our society, though its hold has clearly been weakening--one of the most unfortunate consequences of the growth of government paternalism. Yet the assignment of responsibility for children to their parents is largely a matter of expediency rather than principle. We believe, and with good reason, that parents have more interest in their children than anyone else and can be relied on to protect them and to assure their development into responsible adults."

Excerpt from "Free to Choose" -- pg. 33
-Milton and Rose Friedman

[HewenttoJared]

How many hundreds of billions do we spend on obesity-related healthcare costs in the US? How many premature deaths? Has noone else every studied epigenetics?

[MadMonk]

The idea regulating the population's ability to choose what they eat for themselves is ridiculous. The effort would be better spent on education of the consequences of their choices.

[oneforone]

How many hundreds of billions do we spend on obesity-related healthcare costs in the US? How many premature deaths? Has noone else every studied epigenetics?

I think that's a flimsy argument. If that could be proven, insurance companies and doctors alike would switched to behavior based pricing and lobbied congress for the ability to dump patients who fail to take an active roll in managing their health problems. Honestly, I think the best way to do it is give insurance companies the freedom to price health insurance just like they do your car insurance. If your a risky driver you pay more, If your safe driver you pay less. People who are more then 20 pounds overweight are that way because it's in their genetics. Worst case scenario 1 out of every 100 people at best eats themself to 500 pounds. Most obese people are born obese from generations of obese people.

In my honest opinion, we are going down the wrong path when it comes to managing health care costs. Micromanaging everyone with bad habits just simply does not work. Anti-Smoking campaigns have been going on for years. We have banned smoking at every place under the sun and drove the price of cigarettes through the roof yet smokers are everywhere you look.

What we need to do is apply common sense to health care:
1. Treatment for common illnesses and basic prentative care should be paid for by the consumer.
2. Emergency Rooms should be reserved for life and limb emergencies.
3. Hospitals and Doctors should be able to charge double when failure to use common sense resulted in illness or injury.
4. When time permits the consumer should know exactly what everything costs before the service is provided.
5. Re-tool laws and regulations so basic medical services can be obtained just easily as one can obtain a cheeseburger. (You can get a cheeseburger anywhere, anytime at a reasonable price.
6. Insurance companies and healthcare provides should give discounts for being healthy. If you eat right, excercise regularly and follow medication orders you should save a bundle on healthcare.
7. Change the mentality of people when it comes to paying for services. People need to pay their bills. You can't go to a grocery store and walk out with food without paying for it. You can't get a haircut or carwash without paying for it. Why should medical services be the same way? Yes there should be means to help the poor in the form of payment plans, scholarships and volunteer hours to payback the costs of the bill. Nobody should be allowed to walk away without paying for services.

[SoonerDave]

How many hundreds of billions do we spend on obesity-related healthcare costs in the US? How many premature deaths? Has no one else every studied epigenetics?

Classic argument of the ends justifying the means. The value and virtue of personal liberty must trump this perverted notion of the nanny state intruding and insinuating itself into every aspect of our private lives, even something as simple as buying a hamburger. Reminds me of the old Soviet "elections," where government officials at the polling places informed voters to "vote YES only" to keep Brezhnev, et al, in power.

You may think that's a ludicrous, slippery slope argument, but to me you stem the tide of unchecked federal power at the water-drop level, not when they're at your door demanding they "protect" you from yourself.

[HewenttoJared]

I'll take that as a no on epigenetics.

Today's normalities are tomorrow's crimes. Look at the history of tobacco, 141. We knew it killed millions for decades before they did anything about it. A return to the tobacco laws of the 1950's would be viewed as horribly immoral by most Americans and yet it was fought tooth and nail by people worried about government overreach.

[RadicalModerate]

Should have banned toys from restaurants unless their average meal met a certain nutritional standard.

Authorities almost caught this guy trying to smuggle a toy into a place serving Unhappy Meals.

[RadicalModerate]

HewenttoJared "I'll take that as a no on epigenetics.
Today's normalities are tomorrow's crimes . . ."

On second--or maybe third--thought . . .
I have to go with HWTJ here. Mainly for his use of epigenetics in a sentence.
(Radical Moderate Loves Big Brother--or Big Sister . . . Big Nanny?) . . .

Choose "My Plate" for me, please . . .



Yet, isn't it interesting how the new, simple, non-geometric, not even vaguely Egyptian,
Government presentation of "for your own good" (above) resembles this convenient staple from a simpler time?

[chuck johnson]

As I've noted before, I lived in San Francisco for about 8 years. I've followed this Happy Meal "ban". First of all, there was no ban on Happy Meals. The law just stipulated that if you want to give toys away with a meal, it needs to meet basic food guidelines. Shortly after the ban was passed, McDonald's rolled out a plan that would meet such guidelines. Also, the people of San Francisco did not pass this ordinance, it was passed by the Board of Supervisors.

There is/was no consternation among the residents of San Francisco for a variety of reasons. As I'm sure most know, SF is a very health conscious city and usually ranks very high in that regard. A law like this just doesn't raise very many eyebrows. Also, there just aren't very many fast-food chains in the city and not many that offer toys. If you look at a restaurant map of the city, what fast food chains do exist tend to almost exclusively be in tourist areas or poor areas. Tourists obviously can't vote and the poor generally do not. The voting public just doesn't care whether this law exist or not. I personally think the law overreaches, but I rarely eat at BK or McD's and I don't plan on taking my future children there either or at least not with any frequency. If I'm going to bribe my kids to eat something, it's going to be something healthy that they probably don't want to eat.

As a side note people here in OKC are tremendously more likely to be overweight than in SF. I'm not saying that to be mean or assert any superiority, but the sheer number of obese and overweight people here in comparison is really shocking. It's the first thing I would notice when I landed at the airport. This is a sentiment shared by all my friends who lived in SF and were home in OKC for the holidays as well. There is a fundamental lifestyle difference between the two cities. It's not just an issue of food quantity/quality, it's an issue of activity.

Also, unless you're at a touristy McD's or BK location, you don't ever want to eat at one that's in a poor neighborhood. Ever. You would never want to take a child into one of them either. There's also a price difference. With the exception of the $1 menu, all the combo meals are a dollar or two more than here. A Big Mac meal at some locations is almost $7 with tax. For that price, there a few hundred taquerias that will sell you a burrito the size of your forearm for under $5.

Here's The San Francisco Unified School District's meal service.

http://www.sfusd.edu/en/nutrition-sc...d-service.html

[PennyQuilts]

The fact that fast food restaurants are only in the poor are touristy areas says a lot. It is odd to even think about "poor" areas in some places, like OKC. We don't have the regimented a class mentality.

[HewenttoJared]

The Hell we don't.

[SoonerDave]

The problem is that people *should* be worried when the government tries to impose its own will on something as individual as food choices. It matters not one bit how "valuable" or how "virtuous" such a law is, nor how much moral superiority that body is said to have, it is fundamentally none of the government's business. What's next? A government mandate to inspect your home refrigerator for what it deems "unhealthy" food? Or "unhealthy" practices? Or "unhealthy" beliefs?

The slippery slope is seen precisely in the following comment: (Note that I add the quote not at all to indict the person who said it, but to illustrate the thought process on the government side that rationalizes these kinds of laws)

There is a fundamental lifestyle difference between the two cities. It's not just an issue of food quantity/quality, it's an issue of activity.

The first step is the government saying "You're not eating the proper foods. We will build laws to prevent it." So we criminalize a restaurateur. The next is "well, those previous laws didn't work, so now we're going to require you to prove you're as active as we think you should be." So then we criminalize a private citizen who, say, doesn't walk two miles a day. Those motivations might even be well-founded, noble ones, but the notion of the government imposing its will in this manner in the name of its own curious sense of social benevolence should bug the fire out of everyone.

The reply might come, "Oh, but everyone knows that they eat "healthy" food, or we do "healthy" things, so that won't bother me," but that's precisely the point. No one becomes indignant about a law and the abject usurpation of governmental authority until it gores their particular ox. Then, in retrospect, it was *obvious* that the government was going too far. But by then, sadly, it's waaay too late.

[RadicalModerate]

I think the FoodNazis need to read more John Stuart Mill.
Starting with the essay: "On Liberty."

Here . . . Let me facilitate that suggestion:

"The object of this essay is to assert one very simple principle, as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual in the way of compulsion and control, whether the means used be physical force in the form of legal penalties or the moral coercion of public opinion. That principle is, that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interferring with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant. He cannot rightfully be compelled to do or forbear because it will be better for him to do so, because it will make him happier, because, in the opinions of others, to do so would be wise, or even right. These are good reasons for remonstrating with him, or reasoning with him, or persuading him, or entreating him, but not for compelling him, or visiting him with any evil in case he do otherwise. To justify that, the conduct from which it is desired to deter him must be calculated to produce evil to someone else. The only part of the conduct of anyone, for which he is amenable to society, is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign."

[FRISKY]

The problem is that people *should* be worried when the government tries to impose its own will on something as individual as food choices. It matters not one bit how "valuable" or how "virtuous" such a law is, nor how much moral superiority that body is said to have, it is fundamentally none of the government's business. What's next? A government mandate to inspect your home refrigerator for what it deems "unhealthy" food? Or "unhealthy" practices? Or "unhealthy" beliefs?

The slippery slope is seen precisely in the following comment: (Note that I add the quote not at all to indict the person who said it, but to illustrate the thought process on the government side that rationalizes these kinds of laws)



The first step is the government saying "You're not eating the proper foods. We will build laws to prevent it." So we criminalize a restaurateur. The next is "well, those previous laws didn't work, so now we're going to require you to prove you're as active as we think you should be." So then we criminalize a private citizen who, say, doesn't walk two miles a day. Those motivations might even be well-founded, noble ones, but the notion of the government imposing its will in this manner in the name of its own curious sense of social benevolence should bug the fire out of everyone.

The reply might come, "Oh, but everyone knows that they eat "healthy" food, or we do "healthy" things, so that won't bother me," but that's precisely the point. No one becomes indignant about a law and the abject usurpation of governmental authority until it gores their particular ox. Then, in retrospect, it was *obvious* that the government was going too far. But by then, sadly, it's waaay too late.

Bingo!

And those same well-founded, noble motivations also cause barriers to mending many other social-economical problems.

Social security can't be looked at, much less overhauled, because no one wants "Granny to be sleeping in the gutter with the winos."

Welfare can't be renovated because the "five kids of that poor, unwed mother might end up in the street starving or freezing to death."

We shouldn't question the money squandered on MMGW because everyone knows "considerable reparations must be made to those poor, unfortunate, third world counties now because in the future the ultra-rich country's cheap energy use might cause catastrophic weather events that would decimate them."

We aren't allowed to fix the education system because what politian would want to "cause little Johnny distress, when everyone knows "It's for the Children."

[PennyQuilts]

The Hell we don't.

There is no way someone would have said we only have fast food in the "poor" parts of town, Hewie. It wouldn't even occur to us. There may be poor parts of - certainly there are - but we don't think in those terms.

[PennyQuilts]

The problem is that people *should* be worried when the government tries to impose its own will on something as individual as food choices. It matters not one bit how "valuable" or how "virtuous" such a law is, nor how much moral superiority that body is said to have, it is fundamentally none of the government's business. What's next? A government mandate to inspect your home refrigerator for what it deems "unhealthy" food? Or "unhealthy" practices? Or "unhealthy" beliefs?

The slippery slope is seen precisely in the following comment: (Note that I add the quote not at all to indict the person who said it, but to illustrate the thought process on the government side that rationalizes these kinds of laws)



The first step is the government saying "You're not eating the proper foods. We will build laws to prevent it." So we criminalize a restaurateur. The next is "well, those previous laws didn't work, so now we're going to require you to prove you're as active as we think you should be." So then we criminalize a private citizen who, say, doesn't walk two miles a day. Those motivations might even be well-founded, noble ones, but the notion of the government imposing its will in this manner in the name of its own curious sense of social benevolence should bug the fire out of everyone.

The reply might come, "Oh, but everyone knows that they eat "healthy" food, or we do "healthy" things, so that won't bother me," but that's precisely the point. No one becomes indignant about a law and the abject usurpation of governmental authority until it gores their particular ox. Then, in retrospect, it was *obvious* that the government was going too far. But by then, sadly, it's waaay too late.

The whole movement to regulate food and smoking is being done because someone has decided that they know best. They justify it on the basis of increased public dollars being spent when people make bad decisions. Okay, fine as far as it goes but tell me this - how is this any different than a fundamentalist preacher using political power to impose their own values? Because if it was "really" about public health/public dollars, why aren't they regulating out of wedlock children, sexual misbehavior and the like - which costs the public untold amounts of money and leads to poverty for children, spread of disease, etc.? There are popular causes such as what we eat and smoke (pursued with a great deal of gusto) and unpopular causes (such as reckless sexual behavior and child rearing) that would be greated with a sneer and accusation that someone is being prudish and imposing their values on others.

[Snowman]

I think a lot of people are giving too much credit to the toys in the happy meals, only a small percentage are real draws that were the motivation for selecting it that day and a fair number are not even wanted. Moving this nation wide could actually be great for the nations land fills in reduction of plastic toys kids hardly played with.

[Jim Kyle]

The fact that fast food restaurants are only in the poor are touristy areas says a lot. It is odd to even think about "poor" areas in some places, like OKC. We don't have the regimented a class mentality.

Could you be too young to remember "The Flats" (between Penn and Villa, south of Cottonwood Creek and north of Reno) which for many years -- most of the last half of the 20th century -- were considered to be occupied only by the equivalent of India's untouchable caste? To this day, the southeast quadrant of the city is looked down upon by residents of the "upper class" regions such as Val Verde, The Greens, or Gallardia. The regimented class mentality has been alive and doing quite well in OKC since April of 1889, and shows no sign of rolling over and playing dead any time within the next hundred years either...