> The imperial system allows retailers (and/or consumer good manufacturers) to take consumers for a giant ride.
That's a really interesting point. However, ultimately I actually don't think it has anything to do with imperial vs. metric, but just consumer culture.
In Europe, when you order a drink the menu tells you how many centiliters it is. In the US, it's just small-medium-large-XL, which every location defines however they want. And in the US, the difficulty in comparison doesn't have anything to do with imperial units -- it's that one package of tomatoes is defined by volume while another is by weight, and the loose bell peppers are priced per pepper while the packaged ones are priced per weight, and so forth.
Switching to metric wouldn't change any of that.
That's a problem that can seemingly only be addressed by legislation -- e.g. that strawberries and tomatoes must be sold by weight not volume, or that selling produce by the item must also accurately list the average item weight.
Your post reminds me of the additional problem of "The Serving" which is a unit of measurement entirely conjured up by the food manufacturer to serve as the denominator when listing required nutritional information.
A normal 50g bowl of your sugary breakfast cereal too unhealthy? Just define a "serving" as 20g and cut all your bad numbers by 2/5! Problem solved! Is your bag of chips full of salt? Just invent a "Serving Size" of three chips and you don't have to draw attention to yourself on the nutrition label.
Letting companies define their own units of measurement seems to be a totally preventable regulatory mistake.
Indeed, it's something the EU prevented. There are regulations on what the standard serving size is, and other regulations specifying how the item must be priced -- so all the milk says "per litre" under the price tag in the supermarket, even the fancy one in a tiny bottle.
There were also preferred size regulations, which was meant to make it even easier. Breand could only be sold in multiples of 400g. I think this was relaxed, but it's still present for some things. A standard bottle of wine is always 75cL, for example.
That's a really interesting point. However, ultimately I actually don't think it has anything to do with imperial vs. metric, but just consumer culture.
In Europe, when you order a drink the menu tells you how many centiliters it is. In the US, it's just small-medium-large-XL, which every location defines however they want. And in the US, the difficulty in comparison doesn't have anything to do with imperial units -- it's that one package of tomatoes is defined by volume while another is by weight, and the loose bell peppers are priced per pepper while the packaged ones are priced per weight, and so forth.
Switching to metric wouldn't change any of that.
That's a problem that can seemingly only be addressed by legislation -- e.g. that strawberries and tomatoes must be sold by weight not volume, or that selling produce by the item must also accurately list the average item weight.