We knew we ate more; we knew we had gained weight. Now a new study that looked at 30 years of Americans’ eating habits has pinned down how many more calories, carbohydrates and fats are eaten daily.
From 1971 to 2000, the study found, women increased their caloric intake by 22 percent, men by 7 percent.
Much of the change was found to be due to an increase in the amount of carbohydrates we have been eating. The findings may reinforce the current trend, among those sometimes known as carb-avoids, of reducing or even eliminating foods like breads and pasta.
And while the percentage of calories Americans get from fat, especially saturated fats, has decreased, the numbers might be deceiving. The actual amount of fat eaten daily has gone up. It just makes up a smaller percentage of the total caloric pie now that we are eating so many more carbs…
Part of the problem, some experts say, may stem from the traditional dietary advice to steer clear of fatty foods. This advice, they say, helped set off an explosion of “fat-free,” carbohydrate-laden foods that Americans mistakenly believed they could eat with few consequences. [NYTimes]
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