Local Food Regulations: Good or Bad?

Like them or hate them, soda taxes are proving effective at curbing intake of sugary drinks. After the city of Berkeley, California, implemented a penny-per-ounce soda tax in 2014, consumption of sweetened drinks, including soda and energy drinks, plummeted by 21% in lower income neighborhoods. Three years later, city-polled residents reported drinking 52% fewer of these beverages than they did before the tax passed. On the flipside, water consumption rose by an average of 29% over the 3-year period. https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.2019.304971

In another example of nutrition policy, New York City enacted a much-publicized ban on trans fats in restaurants in 2006. A separate study has now shown that the policy had definitively positive health benefits by causing trans-fatty-acid levels in the blood of New York City residents to fall by slightly more than half in the years after the ban and before a nationwide cutoff came into effect in 2018. Notably, people who ate out more often saw more impressive results, with blood lipid levels dropping by about 62%. https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.2018.304930

Do you favor government regulations that aim to improve the diets and health of Americans? Do you consider such policies signs of a nanny state and think we should focus on self-regulation of dietary habits? Are there more effective ways than levying taxes and banning certain ingredients to improve what people eat and drink?

Objectively, I feel more comfortable with policies such as the soda tax than I do an with a ban, although I agree that both are beneficial. However, the research against trans fats has been so overwhelming that trans fats have been banned in all US food products since 2018. In this case, I fully agree with it.