OILS WE EAT 



American housewives .are interested in margarine, the 

 extremes to which some of these restrictive measures 

 go appear to the consumer ridiculous or unfair and con- 

 trary to public interest. 



This last fear is well founded. The basis of this type 

 of legislation has always been, ostensibly, the protec- 

 tion of the consumer. The contention has always been 

 that unless margarine is unmistakably identified by 

 color, it would masquerade as butter, and the public 

 would be twice cheated, in food value and in pocket- 

 book. This position no longer has the force that caused 

 the federal restrictive laws to be passed in 1886. 



In the first place, pure-food laws are now more strict 

 and more effectively enforced. Deliberate sophistica- 

 tion has become risky and is apt to be expensive. Since 

 the old butter tub on the grocery counter has been re- 

 placed by the wrapped and branded package, it is also 

 much more difficult. 



Margarine is admittedly cheaper than butter. But 

 there is not a scrap of evidence that it is in any way 

 less wholesome or less nutritious. Both supply about 

 three thousand two hundred and fifty calories per 

 pound. Reinforced with vitamin A, which vegetable 

 oils lack, no nutritional difference has been detected 

 between margarine and butter in thousands of scientific 

 dietary tests. In fact, when enriched with nine thousand 

 units of vitamin A, which is the legal minimum, mar- 

 garine can boast superiority during the winter months 



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