Changes in household food and drink purchases following restrictions on the advertisement of high fat, salt, and sugar products across the Transport for London network: A controlled interrupted time series analysis.

BACKGROUND: Restricting the advertisement of products with high fat, salt, and sugar (HFSS) content has been recommended as a policy tool to improve diet and tackle obesity, but the impact on HFSS purchasing is unknown. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of HFSS advertising restrictions, implemented across the London (UK) transport network in February 2019, on HFSS purchases. METHODS AND FINDINGS: Over 5 million take-home food and drink purchases were recorded by 1,970 households (London [intervention], n = 977; North of England [control], n = 993) randomly selected from the Kantar Fast Moving Consumer Goods panel. The intervention and control samples were similar in household characteristics but had small differences in main food shopper sex, socioeconomic position, and body mass index. Using a controlled interrupted time series design, we estimated average weekly household purchases of energy and nutrients from HFSS products in the post-intervention period (44 weeks) compared to a counterfactual constructed from the control and pre-intervention (36 weeks) series. Energy purchased from HFSS products was 6.7% (1,001.0 kcal, 95% CI 456.0 to 1,546.0) lower among intervention households compared to the counterfactual. Relative reductions in purchases of fat (57.9 g, 95% CI 22.1 to 93.7), saturated fat (26.4 g, 95% CI 12.4 to 40.4), and sugar (80.7 g, 95% CI 41.4 to 120.1) from HFSS products were also observed. Energy from chocolate and confectionery purchases was 19.4% (317.9 kcal, 95% CI 200.0 to 435.8) lower among intervention households than for the counterfactual, with corresponding relative reductions in fat (13.1 g, 95% CI 7.5 to 18.8), saturated fat (8.7 g, 95% CI 5.7 to 11.7), sugar (41.4 g, 95% CI 27.4 to 55.4), and salt (0.2 g, 95% CI 0.1 to 0.2) purchased from chocolate and confectionery. Relative reductions are in the context of secular increases in HFSS purchases in both the intervention and control areas, so the policy was associated with attenuated growth of HFSS purchases rather than absolute reduction in HFSS purchases. Study limitations include the lack of out-of-home purchases in our analyses and not being able to assess the sustainability of observed changes beyond 44 weeks. CONCLUSIONS: This study finds an association between the implementation of restrictions on outdoor HFSS advertising and relative reductions in energy, sugar, and fat purchased from HFSS products. These findings provide support for policies that restrict HFSS advertising as a tool to reduce purchases of HFSS products.

Searching for laws of economics: causality, conservation, and ideology.

This review is intended for scientists who may be curious about "laws" of economics. Here, I search for laws governing value, including the value of money (inflation). I begin by searching out early scientists, e.g., Aristotle, Copernicus, and Galileo, who contributed to theories of value, or who, like Isaac Newton and J. Willard Gibbs, inspired students of political economy and thereby profoundly influenced the evolution of economic thinking. From a period ranging from Aristotle to John Stuart Mill in the mid-nineteenth century, I extract two candidates for "laws" of economics, one the well-known "law of supply and demand" (LSD) and the other, less well-known, "Fisher's equation of exchange" (FEE). LSD, in one form or another, has been central to the development of economic thought, but it has proven impossible to express LSD in any compact, deterministic form with causal implications. I propose, however, that, as suggested by Irving Fisher early in the twentieth century and 100 years later by Nobelist Thomas Schelling, FEE is analogous to the first law of thermodynamics (FLT). I argue that both FEE and FLT can be viewed as "accounting identities," pertaining to energies in the case of FLT and money in the case of FEE. Both, however, suffer from a similar limitation: neither provides any information concerning causal relations among the relevant variables. I reflect upon the impact of the absence of firm, fact-based, economic laws with causal implications on modern economic policy, allowing it to be dominated by ideologies damaging to American society.

Trade challenges at the World Trade Organization to national noncommunicable disease prevention policies: A thematic document analysis of trade and health policy space.

BACKGROUND: It has long been contested that trade rules and agreements are used to dispute regulations aimed at preventing noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). Yet most analyses of trade rules and agreements focus on trade disputes, potentially overlooking how a challenge to a regulation's consistency with trade rules may lead to 'policy or regulatory chill' effects whereby countries delay, alter, or repeal regulations in order to avoid the costs of a dispute. Systematic empirical analysis of this pathway to impact was previously prevented by a dearth of systematically coded data. METHODS AND FINDINGS: Here, we analyse a newly created dataset of trade challenges about food, beverage, and tobacco regulations among 122 World Trade Organization (WTO) members from January 1, 1995 to December 31, 2016. We thematically describe the scope and frequency of trade challenges, analyse economic asymmetries between countries raising and defending them, and summarise 4 cases of their possible influence. Between 1995 and 2016, 93 food, beverage, and tobacco regulations were challenged at the WTO. 'Unnecessary' trade costs were the focus of 16.4% of the challenges. Only one (1.1%) challenge remained unresolved and escalated to a trade dispute. Thirty-nine (41.9%) challenges focussed on labelling regulations, and 18 (19.4%) focussed on quality standards and restrictions on certain products like processed meats and cigarette flavourings. High-income countries raised 77.4% (n = 72) of all challenges raised against low- and lower-middle-income countries. We further identified 4 cases in Indonesia, Chile, Colombia, and Saudi Arabia in which challenges were associated with changes to food and beverage regulations. Data limitations precluded a comprehensive evaluation of policy impact and challenge validity. CONCLUSIONS: Policy makers appear to face significant pressure to design food, beverage, and tobacco regulations that other countries will deem consistent with trade rules. Trade-related influence on public health policy is likely to be understated by analyses limited to formal trade disputes.

The moral economy of austerity: analysing UK welfare reform.

This paper notes the contemporary emergence of 'morality' in both sociological argument and political rhetoric, and analyses its significance in relation to ongoing UK welfare reforms. It revisits the idea of 'moral economy' and identifies two strands in its contemporary application; that all economies depend on an internal moral schema, and that some external moral evaluation is desirable. UK welfare reform is analysed as an example of the former, with reference to three distinct orientations advanced in the work of Freeden (1996), Laclau (2014), and Lockwood (1996). In this light, the paper then considers challenges to the reform agenda, drawn from third sector and other public sources. It outlines the forms of argument present in these challenges, based respectively on rationality, legality, and morality, which together provide a basis for evaluation of the welfare reforms and for an alternative 'moral economy'.

Punching loan sharks on the nose: effective interventions to reduce financial hardship in New Zealand.

ISSUES ADDRESSED: Growth in the high-cost, unregulated fringe lender market (with these lenders commonly referred to as loan sharks) has occurred both internationally and in New Zealand in recent years. The credit practices of loan sharks create financial hardship for many people including Maori, Pacific and low-income New Zealanders. This paper reports on research that explored strategies for reducing the impact of the fringe lender market on Maori, Pacific and low-income New Zealanders. METHODS: A narrative literature review and 10 key informant interviews were conducted to provide information on how best to intervene to reduce the impact of the fringe lender market for these people. RESULTS: The main interventions identified were: two regulatory approaches, one for capping interest rates and another to create codes of responsible lending; access to safe affordable micro-finance options; financial literacy education; and Pacific cultural change around fa'alavelave, which are the 'obligations' of giving. CONCLUSIONS: Protecting consumers from the unsafe practices of fringe lenders requires a combined approach of discouraging the undesirable practices of fringe lenders through regulation and encouraging the growth of safe, affordable micro-finance options. Financial literacy education is a valuable activity for directing consumer attention to the safest options, but in isolation will have limited effect if options are limited. Health promoters have a valuable role to play in implementing these interventions.

Hijacked organic, limited local, faulty fair trade: what's a radical to eat?

Organic farming has been hijacked by big business. Local food can have a larger carbon footprint than products shipped in from overseas. Fair trade doesn't address the real concerns of farmers in the global South. As the food movement has moved from the countercultural fringe to become a mainstream phenomenon, organic, local, and fair trade advocates have been beset by criticism from overt foes and erstwhile allies alike. Now that Starbucks advertises fair trade coffee and Kraft owns Boca soy burgers, it's fair to ask, "What's a radical to eat?"

Association of the Implementation of Child Tax Credit Advance Payments With Food Insufficiency in US Households.

Importance: A key component of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 included an expansion of the Child Tax Credit with advance payments beginning in July 2021, a "child allowance" that was projected to dramatically reduce child poverty. Food insufficiency has increased markedly during the economic crisis spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic, with disparities among marginalized populations, and may be associated with substantial health care and social costs. Objective: To assess whether the introduction of advance payments for the Child Tax Credit in mid-July 2021 was associated with changes in food insufficiency in US households with children. Design, Setting, and Participants: This cross-sectional study used data from several phases of the Household Pulse Survey, conducted by the US Census Bureau from January 6 to August 2, 2021. The survey had 585 170 responses, representing a weighted population size of 77 165 153 households. Exposure: The first advance Child Tax Credit payment, received on July 15, 2021. Main Outcomes and Measures: Household food insufficiency. Results: The weighted sample of 585 170 respondents was mostly female (51.5%) and non-Hispanic White (62.5%), with a plurality aged 25 to 44 years (48.1%), having a 4-year degree or more (34.7%) and a 2019 household income of $75 000 to $149 999 (23.1%). In the weeks after the first advance payment of the Child Tax Credit was made (July 21 to August 2, 2021), 62.4% of households with children reported receiving it compared with 1.1% of households without children present (P < .001). There was a 3.7-percentage point reduction (95% CI, -0.055 to -0.019 percentage points; P < .001) in household food insufficiency for households with children present in the survey wave after the first advance payment of the Child Tax Credit, corresponding to a 25.9% reduction, using an event study specification. Difference-in-differences (-16.4%) and modified Poisson (-20.8%) models also yielded large estimates for reductions in household food insufficiency associated with the first advance payment of the expanded Child Tax Credit. Conclusions and Relevance: This study suggests that the Child Tax Credit advance payment increased household income and may have acted as a buffer against food insufficiency. However, its expansion and advance payment are only a temporary measure for 2021. Congress must consider whether to extend these changes or make them permanent and improve implementation to reduce barriers to receipt for low-income families.

Perceived barriers to opportunity and their relation to substance use among Latino immigrant men.

Theory and empirical evidence suggest that perceived barriers to opportunity, such as discrimination, can lead to the adoption of unhealthy behaviors. The study assessed the relationship between perceived racial/ethnic, language and legal status barriers to opportunity and substance use among Latino immigrant men in North Carolina. Logistic regression was used to test for the association between perceived barriers and odds of binge drinking in the past 30 days and cigarette smoking. In both crude and adjusted models, perceived language barriers (OR = 3.05, 95% CI: 1.78-5.25) and legal status barriers (OR = 2.25, 95% CI: 1.26-4.01) were associated with increased odds of having engaged in binge drinking. Perceived barriers to opportunity were not significantly associated with cigarette smoking. Further research is needed to better understand the effect of language and legal status barriers on health among Latino immigrants.

Economic advice as a vocation: symbioses of scientific and political authority.

Academic economists perform an important function in advising politicians and state bureaucrats, lending them epistemological authority. This creates a challenge of institutional design and of professional vocation, of how these experts can combine their commitment to scientific analysis with their commitment towards their governmental patrons. This article examines the case of anti-trust economics, in which government economists are encouraged to remain as academically engaged as possible, so that their advice will be - or appear to be - unpolluted by political or bureaucratic pressures. Yet this ideal is constantly compromised by the fact that the economists are nevertheless government employees, working beneath lawyers. Max Weber's concept of a 'vocation' is adopted to explore this tension, and his two lectures, 'Science as a Vocation' and 'Politics as a Vocation' are read side by side, to consider this core dilemma of academic policy advisors.

Economic participation and national self-identification of refugees in the Netherlands.

This study examines whether refugees self-identify as a member of the host society. We use survey data of more than 2,500 Somali, Iraqi, Afghani, Iranian, and ex-Yugoslavian refugees in the Netherlands. The results show that economic participation in the host country is positively related to refugees' national self-identification. In addition, we find that refugees' social ties with Dutch natives are associated with national self-identification and that the relationship between economic participation and national self-identification is partially explained by these social ties. Perceived discrimination is not related to refugees' national self-identification. Implications of these findings for debates on immigration and integration are discussed.

Embedding economic relationships through social learning? The limits of patient and public involvement in healthcare governance in England.

The strategy for NHS modernization in England is privileging individual choice over collective voice in the governance of healthcare. This paper explores the tension between economic and democratic strands in the current reform agenda, drawing on sociological conceptions of embeddedness and on theories of reflexive governance. Building on a Polanyian account of the disembedding effects of the increasing commercialization of health services, we consider the prospects for re-embedding economic relationships in this field. An analysis is provided of the limits of the present legal and regulatory framework of Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) in establishing the democratic and pragmatist conditions of social learning necessary for effective embedding. We show how the attainment of reflexive governance in the public interest is dependent on such conditions, and on the capacities of patients and the public to contribute to debate and deliberation in decision making, including on fundamental policy questions such as how services are provided and by whom.

The neoliberal state and the penalization of misery.

The strategy adopted by the neoliberal state to maintain social order and safeguard private property in a context of economic deregulation and social precariousness has destroyed the welfare state and aggravated poverty, depriving the masses of any form of social protection while subjecting them to repression. The reinforcement of the repressive state apparatus is associated with the social instability provoked by the lack of social policies, the degradation of living conditions for the great majority of the population, and the amplification of income and property inequalities both in the so-called capitalist periphery and in the richest industrialized countries. The penalization of misery is revealed as a new expression of class domination.

Poppies for medicine in Afghanistan: lessons from India and Turkey.

This study examines India and Turkey as case studies relevant to the Senlis Council's 'poppies for medicine' proposal. The proposal is that Afghan farmers are licensed to produce opium for medical and scientific purposes. Here it is posited that the Senlis proposal neglects at least three key lessons from the Turkish and Indian experiences. First, not enough weight has been given to diversion from licit markets, as experienced in India. Second, both India and Turkey had significantly more efficient state institutions with authority over the licensed growing areas. Third, the proposal appears to overlook the fact that Turkey's successful transition was largely due to the use of the poppy straw method of opium production. It is concluded that, while innovative and creative policy proposals such as that of the Senlis proposal are required if Afghanistan is to move beyond its present problems, 'poppies for medicine' does not withstand evidence-based scrutiny.

Colonialism, planters, sugarcane, and the agrarian economy of Caguas, Puerto Rico, between the 1890s and 1930.

This article presents new research on the impact and consequences of the incorporation of Puerto Rico into the American economic sphere of influence and how much change truly took place during the first decades of the twentieth century. As reconstructed here, Puerto Rico's social and economic structure did change after the American invasion. However, a closer look at the data reveals that, contrary to the generally accepted conclusions, land tenure did not become concentrated in fewer hands. Puerto Rico did experience profound changes with the rapid growth of US agribusiness and the penetration of American capital. In the process of arriving on the island, these two interests found a land tenure system in the firm control of local farmers (small, medium, and large). The American invasion and subsequent incorporation of the island into the American economic/political system as a non-incorporated territory provided the conditions for the numerical increase of farms and farmers in the island during the first three decades of the twentieth century.

"Stones run it": taking back control of organized crime in Chicago, 1940-1975.

In the 1960s and 1970s African American "supergangs" emerged in Chicago. Many scholars have touted the "prosocial" goals of these gangs but fail to contextualize them in the larger history of black organized crime. Thus, they have overlooked how gang members sought to reclaim the underground economy in their neighborhoods. Yet even as gangs drove out white organized crime figures, they often lacked the know-how to reorganize the complex informal economy. Inexperienced gang members turned to extreme violence, excessive recruitment programs, and unforgiving extortion schemes to take power over criminal activities. These methods alienated black citizens and exacerbated tensions with law enforcement. In addition, the political shelter enjoyed by the previous generation of black criminals was turned into pervasive pressure to break up street gangs. Black street gangs fulfilled their narrow goal of community control of vice. Their interactions with their neighbors, however, remained contentious.

The political economy of maize production and poverty reduction in Zambia: analysis of the last 50 years.

Poverty and food security are endemic issues in much of sub-Saharan Africa. To eradicate extreme poverty and hunger in the region remains a key Millennium Development Goal. Many African governments have pursued economic reforms and agricultural policy interventions in order to accelerate economic growth that reduces poverty faster. Agricultural policy regimes in Zambia in the last 50 years (1964­2008) are examined here to better understand their likely impact on food security and poverty, with an emphasis on the political economy of maize subsidy policies. The empirical work draws on secondary sources and an evaluation of farm household data from three villages in the Kasama District of Zambia from 1986/87 and 1992/93 to estimate a two-period econometric model to examine the impact on household welfare in a pre- and post-reform period. The analysis shows that past interventions had mixed effects on enhancing the production of food crops such as maize. While such reforms were politically popular, it did not necessarily translate into household-level productivity or welfare gains in the short term. The political economy of reforms needs to respond to the inherent diversity among the poor rural and urban households. The potential of agriculture to generate a more pro-poor growth process depends on the creation of new market opportunities that most benefit the rural poor. The state should encourage private sector investments for addressing infrastructure constraints to improve market access and accelerate more pro-poor growth through renewed investments in agriculture, rural infrastructure, gender inclusion, smarter subsidies and regional food trade. However, the financing of such investments poses significant challenges. There is a need to address impediments to the effective participation of public private investors to generate more effective poverty reduction and hunger eradication programmes. This article also explores the opportunities for new public­private investments through South­South cooperation and Asia-driven growth for reducing poverty in Zambia.

Institutions and poverty.

This study utilises eight alternative measures of institutions and the instrumental variable method to examine the impacts of institutions on poverty. The estimates show that an economy with a robust system to control corruption, an effective government, and a stable political system will create the conditions to promote economic growth, minimise income distribution conflicts, and reduce poverty. Corruption, ineffective governments, and political instability will not only hurt income levels through market inefficiencies, but also escalate poverty incidence via increased income inequality. The results also imply that the quality of the regulatory system, rule of law, voice and accountability, and expropriation risk are inversely related to poverty but their effect on poverty is via average income rather than income distribution.