Sugar is antibacterial, hence why honey can stay good like forever. It's a cheap way to increase shelf life that also makes people really like the food because we evolutionary seek that stuff out. It's not right though. We work long hours so convenient foods should allow us to buy back some time. But when they're all like this, you end up either having to do it yourself or risk your health. There should absolutely be limits. But with food costs as they are, who is going to fight for that? The alternatives are more expensive, or you reduce shelf life. It's much better regulated here in the EU but we too are still not there, obesity is still on the rise.

Were I live sugar is added to cider, making it basically extra sweet apple juice with a touch of alchool.

I live in the UK and was astounded at the sugar consumption when I visited the US.

The most interesting one was bread - it was so sweet, almost like cake, while our bread is just plan savoury bread.

There seems to be an OTT approach to added sweetness that I thought was bad in the UK but is next level in north America.

Another key difference was the milk in coffee shops. I went into Double cup and found some half and half (semi skimmed milk?) and dumped a bunch of it in my coffee. Nope literally half cream half milk. Blllerchhhh.

That just doesn't even exist over here.

You can also just get fruity syrup and make syrup juice with a lot of water.