Water, water everywhere but no two types are regulated the same way. It’s a mouthful but a new report suggests that consumers know less about expensive bottled water than they do about what comes out of the tap for free.
Now the Government Accounting Office is suggesting better labeling, to differentiate between bottled water which is regulated by the FDA and municipal tap water which is regulated by the EPA. Here is the GAO testimony (PDF), presented to Congress this week.
Americans drank 8.6 billion gallons of bottled water in 2008, twice that which was consumed ten years ago. Bottled water is a big business, worth about $16 billion a year. But few consumers ever know where the water comes from or if it is better for them than drinking tap water. One report found most people believe that bottled water is healthier.
