Why did everything taste better when I was a child? Why have the food industry messed everything up?

It is the changing of your taste-buds and in your imagination.

I believe there are two reasons for food not tasting so good now:

Firstly, when you're a child you're experiencing new flavours all the time, which is wonderfully exciting. However, as you get older, you've tasted most foods a number of times before, so the taste doesn't excite you as much as it used to.

Secondly, as we age, the taste buds begin to disappear from the sides and roof of the mouth, leaving taste buds mostly on our tongue. The remaining taste buds eventually become less sensitive. Smoking and eating scalding liquids can damage them further. Our sense of smell also decreases as we get older, and smell and taste are intimately linked.

So I'm afraid it's more likely that our decreasing enjoyment of food is down moreso to psychology and biology, rather than the food industry.

actually it is true that age and our own indulgences muck up and even destroy our ability to taste our food, age and over sweetening and spicing all take away the freshness of being able to taste our food(and that's without allergy concerns!)

Because the Food Police were not as strict then as they are today