Being an American consumer gets harder every day.

You have to consider the value, the nutrition (if it’s food) and whether the product was ethically produced.

On top of these already difficult choices, more and more products hit the shelves every day making these decisions more complicated.

But don’t get too stressed out just yet. Help is on the way.

Several companies are developing systems designed to help shoppers make the right decisions. At your local grocery store you may soon find a rating next to every product.

Right now these rating systems are being designed specifically for food products. Depending on which system is being used, foods will have numerical, star or letter ratings next to the products that show how nutritious it is.

While this is a great idea, it shouldn’t stop at nutrition.

Consumers nowadays care about more than just buying something that is good for them. They want products that are good for the world, too.

People want to buy products that are ethically produced. They want to do business with companies they trust and companies that pay fair wages, are mindful of the environment and have a history of ethical management practice.

An unbiased third party organization should create a rating system that evaluates the social and environmental responsibility of companies. These ratings should be posted on or next to the product when put in retail stores.

Negative ratings would inevitably end up next to some products, which would hurt a store’s sales of those particular items.

However, stores with the rating system would attract more customers on average than stores without it.

The only real problem with implementing a system like this would be to find an outside company that would truly remain on the outside.

It would be easy for these rating organizations to develop a bias or be unfairly influenced by the companies they were evaluating.

Assuming an organization was up to the task, these rating systems would make the world a better place and everyone’s life less complicated.