In a past blog, I wrote about the deep lack of information that governments have about ultra-processed foods (UPF), which does not stop them from pursuing an agenda to enact policies on UPFs anyway. As I mentioned before, experts can’t decide on one clear definition of what a UPF actually is. Research has found that both consumers and nutrition experts struggle to consistently identify which foods meet the criteria for being “ultra-processed”. In the United States, Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his Make America Healthy Again initiative has been holding a consultation to try and figure out what UPFs actually are, and has indicated that once they have finally come up with a definition, then the next step is front-of-package labeling. Canada has already gone ahead and introduced front-of-package labelling indicating whether a food product is high in saturated fat, sugar, and/or sodium. This is one policy among many that have been enacted, and will likely be enacted in the future, to stop people from consuming ultra-processed foods.
At first glance, this paternalistic policy could be seen as a positive step that could allow people to avoid obesity and chronic illness. The problem is, nobody can say what UPFs actually are, and when they try, they end up lumping in things like flavoured yogurt and whole wheat bread, and sometimes even apples that have simply been cut into slices. As I also mentioned in my previous blog, there is no conclusive evidence that ties UPFs to chronic illness, so that angle is also useless when trying to make the case for regulation.
One aspect of the debate that is perhaps left out, because governments don’t want to look bad, is the impact of these policies on lower-income people. As with many policies, those with money can circumvent and ignore regulations and laws easily, while lower-income consumers are left to contend with a regulatory world that is increasingly less hospitable to them, even when they go to the grocery store.
There is an insidious idea that the government knows best when it comes to poor people because poor people just don’t know better. The idea tends to be that lower-income people simply don’t have the aptitude or the “pick yourself up from the bootstraps” attitude to get out of their poverty. This leads to two main issues: first, there is a total ignorance by policymakers (purposefully or otherwise) of the socio-economic factors of poverty, and the cycles of poverty created by the societies that individuals live in and that are out of people’s control. Second, this way of thinking leads to policymakers’ blind confidence that they must save these poor people from themselves by regulating their lives and wagging their finger at them like children.
What do you think about when you think about UPFs? Frozen pizzas? Hot dogs? Boxed macaroni and cheese? These are all thought of as “junk food”, something that health-conscious people would never eat. They are quick, convenient, and easy to make, and that makes a huge difference for people who don’t have time to cook. That does not only include lower-income people, but also includes people with jobs with long hours and difficult schedules who need something quick and easy to get them through the day. It is also heavily onerous on lower-income people, whose time is often taken up by working more than one job, transporting their children to school and activities with no support, and who often have to make a quick and cheap meal to keep their families and themselves fed.
Many lower-income people are usually working hard to make up for their lack of time and/or lack of funds to keep their families going. It is necessary to find every possible way that you can to feed your kids when you’re working two or three jobs as a single mother. And that sometimes means you grab that cheap and convenient frozen pizza, and that’s going to deliver the appropriate amount of calories to your family for the night. Rather than being applauded for taking care of her family, this single mother now has to walk into the supermarket and be shamed by a front-of package label that tells her she’s harming her children by giving them too many saturated fats, sodium, and/or sugar based on flawed information from a lack of data. Is it too much sodium for her family? What is the basis of “too much”, anyway? For whom is it too much sodium, have they determined the appropriate amounts for every single person in the country? These questions can’t be answered and yet those labels exist anyway.
Now, think of a few staple food items that tend to sound healthy and are eaten by potentially higher-income people who are viewed by the government and experts as being economically and educationally privileged enough to put their health first. Your mind might go to things like protein powder, whole-wheat bread, plant-based milk, and Greek yogurt. The problem is that what sounds like a grocery list for a high-cost, exclusive grocery store is actually just a list of ultra-processed foods based on the possible definitions being put forward by various “experts”.
Privileged experts and politicians look down from their ivory towers to say “let them eat healthier” while having no compassion for the realities of life for lower-income people. The United States is already feeling the effects of this paternalism. In the United States, 18 states were approved to restrict SNAP purchases of sugary drinks, candy, and prepared desserts. Five states began enforcement on January 1, 2026.
It is not surprising that this is the case. If you look at the history of experts trying to define UFPs, there are plenty of anti-low income coded words strewn throughout. I have highlighted those words below:
2010: “create durable, accessible, convenient, and palatable ready-to-eat or ready-to-heat food products liable to be consumed as snacks or desserts or to replace home-prepared dishes.”
2012: “The purpose is to devise durable, convenient, high- or ultra-palatable, and profitable products.”
2014: “durable, convenient, accessible, highly or ultra-palatable, often habit-forming.”
2025: “undergo processing techniques like pre-frying, molding, extrusion, fractioning, and other chemical alterations that leave the final products bearing almost no resemblance to the original ingredients.”
Between 2010 and 2014, we see words like accessible, convenient, and replacing home-prepared dishes. These are all practices presumably of people who do not have time to prepare a home-prepared meal for their families, and opt for convenient replacements. While this applies negatively to everyone who needs to reach for convenient food, it disproportionately will harm lower-income people who are already struggling to buy groceries for their families.
This harm is coming from a world in which experts are essentially saying “why can’t everyone just do the things that we think are right?!” without taking into account the individual lives people live within different socio-economic backgrounds and realities. This, at its core, is the most essential problem with regulating how people eat, because each person has their own genetic background, diseases they contend with, diets they follow, and economic realities they must contend with. No one policy can work for everyone. No centralized government policy can be expected to work for each person and family.
Food is sustenance, there’s nothing “virtuous” about certain foods over others. It’s all about choices, because when it is not, that leads to things like sugar taxes and bans on purchasing UPF through welfare programs, which takes agency away from people for the simple fact that they happen to be poor. Regulations on UPFs disproportionately burden low-income households who rely on these foods for affordability, convenience, and shelf-stability. Legislating against UPFs risks unintended economic fallout, the inability to live the life one wants to live, and further shaming lower-income consumers. To do all of that without even having a solid definition of what UPFs are is irresponsible, and a path towards a slew of bad policies that will hurt people rather than save them from themselves.