Calorie-counting has always been perceived and marketed as a woman’s game. Stars like Valerie Bertinelli and Kirstie Alley help propogate the myth.  But last I checked, men also require calories to survive.

I lost a bunch of weight by counting calories… and it was surprisingly easy. Learn how to do the math, and then feed yourself the quotient.

But as I learned in exploring whether nutritional labels have any effect on our eating habits… most of us never took the math class, and therefore, haven’t got a clue how to read the tables.

(Hear the story as aired on Metro Morning: Nutrition label able? and Nutrition labels listener feedback)

Here’s a handy-dandy aid to nutrition tables.

The new credit card rules assume the same thing: tell people the consequences of their actions, and they will make better choices.

But in the case of a credit card, the real problem is not that we manage our debt better. Rather it’s that we should have learned all about credit BEFORE we ever received a Visa.

Trying to get people to count calories by posting the numbers on packaging is no better.

Even Valerie Bertinelli had a tutor.