Several decades of commercial weight-loss diets, ranging from the Drinking Man’s Diet to the low-carb Atkins Diet, each claiming to be the best way to get rid of unwanted fat with minimal or no sacrifice to taste and satiety, tempted those struggling with rising poundage. Most, however, involved a radical change in people’s eating habits that was rarely sustainable. After a while, dieters returned to their old habits and regained the lost weight, often more than they had lost in the first place.

As Dr. Livingston stated, “Providing patients with the false hope that if they only reduce one class of foods or another (e.g., carbohydrates or fats) they will lose weight can become frustrating, and may in part explain the failure of most diets.” Even reducing consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (which provide no nutrients beyond sweet calories), he wrote, “is not likely to influence obesity at the population level,” which has continued to increase even as soda consumption has declined.

Rather than a soda tax, Dr. Livingston endorsed taxes based on the calorie content of foods, and using the revenue generated “to subsidize healthy foods to make them more affordable.” Noting that “the common denominator for all successful diet plans is calorie reduction, irrespective of how that is achieved,” he said that a slimmer American populace can be achieved only if attention is paid to the entire food supply.

That attention is unlikely to be paid anytime soon by either the processed food industry or government regulatory agencies, so it is up to consumers to take matters into their own hands, eyes and mouths. The goal is not radical change but a reduction in calories of 500 a day and/or an increase in physical activity to achieve a weekly deficit of 3,500 calories, the approximate amount in one pound of body fat.

Just eliminating any of these — a bagel with cream cheese, one Big Mac, a Belgian waffle with a drizzle of syrup, one cup of Häagen-Dazs Green Tea ice cream, a Starbucks Venti Caramel Frappuccino with whipped cream, or one serving of a Cheesecake Factory Santa Fe chicken salad — will create that 500-calorie deficit. (For the sake of comparison, you’d have to eat six apples or seven eggs to get to 500 calories. Or you could choose a two-cup Wegman’s Caesar salad for a mere 200 calories.)

If you live in a city that mandates calorie listings on menus, pay attention before you order. Also always request dressings and sauces on the side and drizzle them on yourself rather than let the restaurant pour hundreds of calories on a low-calorie salad or chicken breast.