Do you think the FDA has too much power?

[sc94597]

Skullwaker said:

sc94597 said:

Skullwaker said:

sc94597 said:

Skullwaker said:
Well, only one person in the FDA regulates the entire water bottle industry, so yes.

Do you have a source for that?

Beginning with the paragraph that starts with "FDA and state bottled water programs are seriously underfunded." http://www.nrdc.org/water/drinking/bw/exesum.asp

Notice how it doesn't say that. It says that the FDA has the equivalent of less than one person. Which likely means that there are many people who regulate bottled water, but they also do many other things, spending about as much time  regulating bottled water as if there were one staff member dedicated to this. But the report goes on to mention how this is an inefficiency of allocation of resources. The FDA spends more than it needs to on tap water and less than it needs to on bottled water. 

That's essentially the same thing then, perhaps even worse because there's no one that has a dedicated job of regulating bottled water. Regardless though, they don't spend enough time or resources on it. At this point, bottled water is more harmful than tap water, and big businesses spend so much money trying to convince us otherwise. If you have any interest in this topic, I really advise that you watch or at least skim the documentary "FLOW: For Love of Water." It's really informative and faces the facts, dangers and possible solutions of our situation regarding water.

Honestly, it is a way to skew people to support their cause. Ten people working for one hour each are much more efficient than one person working for ten hours. Same is true for say 20 people spending some of their time working on regulating bottled water vs. one person spending all of his/her time. 20 people have vastly more skills and knowledge than one person.  Nevertheless, I do believe that there is an inconsistency here. There should be no reason why tap water is regulated so much more than bottled water, if the system is suppose to be equitable. 

I'll skim the documentary you mentioned though. I don't doubt that the FDA chooses favorites here. They do it in pretty much every industry they regulate.