Paul Krugman argues America's food quality is what it was a century in the time of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle. A lax FDA (and its industry cohorts) is to blame for the recent "tainted spinach, poisonous peanut butter and, currently, the attack of the killer tomatoes."
Economics is a strange discipline because it really just requires people to take lessons they follow in their everyday life and apply them consistently. The lesson here is that we don't want zero risk when it comes to food. Do you boil every glass of water that comes your way? Demand tests on meat that you get in a restaurant? Grow your own food? Avoid eating at authentic restaurants abroad? Failure to do these things puts us at risk but we gladly accept it. Avoiding that risk is too costly: zero risk is not optimal.
Ensuring consistency does a lot for a good argument. Krugman scoffs at the free-market argument against the FDA--that "private companies would avoid taking risks with public health to safeguard their reputations and to avoid damaging class-action lawsuits." And yet he warns that a lack of regulation for ensuring solid food safety is not "just bad for consumers, it’s bad for business." So firms won't ensure safety on their own because they are too greedy but if the food quality is poor then it's bad for business? I bet he doesn't take a UV light to restaurants, either.
Friday, June 13, 2008
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2 comments:
Okay, to bring in some Game Theory issues...What's to keep the firm selling defective food items and then taking the money and running?
Take that a step further and add David's consistency. What if companies consistently sell defective food items close up shop and open a new place 10 miles away? What if they start clean each time but only rinse dishes instead of washing them? If all fooderies did that, I guess we would all eat at home. AND, it would open an opportunity for some to open a business with clean plates. UB
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