Tax on soda in Jax?

[coredumped]

Of course, this will really only hurt the poor since they don't have the ability to get it elsewhere, or extra money laying around.

http://www.actionnewsjax.com/news/local/tax-on-soda-jacksonville-organization-pushes-the-proposed-legislation/480849749

[spuwho]

Of course, this will really only hurt the poor since they don't have the ability to get it elsewhere, or extra money laying around.

http://www.actionnewsjax.com/news/local/tax-on-soda-jacksonville-organization-pushes-the-proposed-legislation/480849749

Tax french fries? Hardees Big and Beefy? McDonalds Double Quarter Pounder?

If you want to create an obesity or calorie tax, why stop at sodas? Candy? Steaks?

Many employers offer breaks on health insurance if they participate in a wellness program.  What about diet soda?

We incentivize smokers to quit by taxing it to death, but yet smoking persists.

This is a dead end.

[Adam White]

Of course, this will really only hurt the poor since they don't have the ability to get it elsewhere, or extra money laying around.

http://www.actionnewsjax.com/news/local/tax-on-soda-jacksonville-organization-pushes-the-proposed-legislation/480849749

Tax french fries? Hardees Big and Beefy? McDonalds Double Quarter Pounder?

If you want to create an obesity or calorie tax, why stop at sodas? Candy? Steaks?

Many employers offer breaks on health insurance if they participate in a wellness program.  What about diet soda?

We incentivize smokers to quit by taxing it to death, but yet smoking persists.

This is a dead end.

Actually, smoking has been in decline in the USA for years. Taxation, amongst other government interventions, has worked.

Taxing sugar is not the proper approach - setting and enforcing limits on sugar in food (for example) would make more sense.

[coredumped]

I disagree with you Adam that taxing smokes has worked. Education has worked. Also, ecigs have become an alternative. And then there's the black market, the police killed that guy in NYC for selling cigs because the taxes were so high.

Education is the way to go, let people make their own choices.

[Adam White]

I disagree with you Adam that taxing smokes has worked. Education has worked. Also, ecigs have become an alternative. And then there's the black market, the police killed that guy in NYC for selling cigs because the taxes were so high.

Education is the way to go, let people make their own choices.

There's a very strong correlation between tax levels on cigarettes and sales.

That doesn't mean there isn't a black market or that absolutely nobody smokes. My point is that using a tobacco tax as evidence that taxing a product doesn't reduce usage is a poor example - it clearly does. That's certainly what the experts think.

You are not likely to tax something out of existence - but then again, I don't think anyone made that claim. The idea behind a sugar tax would be to reduce (not eliminate) consumption of sugary products in an attempt to reduce obesity (amongs other conditions). Whether or not it would work remains to be seen.

As I said earlier, it would make more sense to go after the source rather than the consumer.

[Adam White]

If you want to depress the sales of something, tax it.

And incidentally, the tax on cigarettes also pays for a pretty massive anti smoking campaign.

Fewer than 15% of Americans smoke tobacco now.  Pretty good considering where we were 30 years ago, when you smoked second hand cigarettes even if you didn't smoke because it was literally everywhere.

http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/only-15-percent-u-s-adults-now-smoke-cdc-finds-n579646

Smoking is the nation's leading cause of preventable illness, causing more than 480,000 deaths each year in the United States, the CDC estimates.

Why the smoking rate fell so much in 2015 — and whether it will fall as fast again — is not quite clear.

About 50 years ago, roughly 42 percent of U.S. adults smoked. It was common nearly everywhere — in office buildings, restaurants, airplanes and even hospitals. The smoking rate's gradual decline has coincided with an increased public understanding that smoking is a cause of cancer, heart disease and other lethal health problems.

Experts attribute recent declines decline to the mounting impact of anti-smoking advertising campaigns, cigarette taxes and smoking bans.

So, to reiterate what I posted in my original post:

Actually, smoking has been in decline in the USA for years. Taxation, amongst other government interventions, has worked.

[Tacachale]

I disagree with you Adam that taxing smokes has worked. Education has worked. Also, ecigs have become an alternative. And then there's the black market, the police killed that guy in NYC for selling cigs because the taxes were so high.

Education is the way to go, let people make their own choices.

There's a very strong correlation between tax levels on cigarettes and sales.

That doesn't mean there isn't a black market or that absolutely nobody smokes. My point is that using a tobacco tax as evidence that taxing a product doesn't reduce usage is a poor example - it clearly does. That's certainly what the experts think.

You are not likely to tax something out of existence - but then again, I don't think anyone made that claim. The idea behind a sugar tax would be to reduce (not eliminate) consumption of sugary products in an attempt to reduce obesity (amongs other conditions). Whether or not it would work remains to be seen.

As I said earlier, it would make more sense to go after the source rather than the consumer.

According to the CDC and other researchers, increasing the price on cigarettes through taxes, which are then used to fund cessation assistance initiatives and educational campaigns, is the single biggest factor in the decline of smoking since the 90s.

http://www.npr.org/2016/05/24/479349619/cdc-report-reveals-decline-in-american-smokers
http://tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/content/11/suppl_1/i62.full

There are also the cessation programs and campaigns themselves, as well as new restrictions on the way cigarettes are marketed - no more marketing to children, putting a big warning labels on ads and packaging, etc.

The black market is mostly localized. In New York, it's due to the fact that New York's excise taxes are so much higher than any other states ($4.35, plus another $1.50 in NYC, while most states have $2 or less). At that price variance, bootleggers have an incentive to get cigarettes from lower taxing states or Oneida Indian Nation and resell them in New York. A few years ago, up to 60% of cigarettes sold in NYC were bootleg. That's probably a sign that New York needs to scale back, though as far as I've read (and I've read a good bit for work), it isn't considered the crime or public nuisance problem that other criminal bootlegging like drugs and stolen goods has been.

[KenFSU]

"The utter contempt with which privileged Eastern liberals such as myself discuss red-state, gun-country, working-class America as ridiculous and morons and rubes is largely responsible for the upswell of rage and contempt and desire to pull down the temple that we're seeing now," Bourdain said.

^This quote from Anthony Bourdain on the election results was the first thing I thought when I read the article about Jacksonville politicians pinching their noses and attempting to enact a tax on those lowly soda drinkers.

And that Dr. suggesting that caffeine-addiction is the primary driver of soda consumption? GTFO.

A soda tax is unequivocally regressive, and reeks of ignorance and insensitivity toward the true socioeconomic roots of the obesity epidemic.

Poor families have limited food budgets and choices, and must often stretch supplies toward the end of the month, before another check or allocation of Food Stamps arrives. This leads to unhealthy behaviors in several ways:

- Families choose high-fat foods dense with energy – foods such as sugars, cereals, potatoes and processed meat products – because these foods are more affordable and last longer than fresh vegetables and fruits, lean meats and fish, and dairy.

- Poor families often live in disadvantaged neighborhoods where healthy foods are hard to find. Instead of large supermarkets, poor neighborhoods have a disproportionate number of fast food chains and small food stores providing cheap, high-fat foods.

- Economic insecurity – such as trouble paying bills or rent – leads to stress, and people often cope by eating high-fat, sugary foods.

The numbers don't lie: The shittier your income, the more likely you are to rely on regular soda as a source of calories.



It's easily available, long-lasting, doesn't need to be refrigerated, and is dirt cheap in terms of calories per dollar.

Enact a soda tax, I can guarantee you the results:

Higher-income citizens with access to more options, education, and support will reduce their soda intake. And people of lower socioeconomic status, stretching paycheck to paycheck and more concerned with keeping a roof over their heads than having a bEaCh BoD, will continue to drink soda - because it's much cheaper and more durable than milk or juice. The poor will thus be even worse off financially as a result.

Comparing cigarettes to soda is apples and gorillas. Cigarettes don't fulfill a basic human need (caloric energy), and smoking causes insane negative externalities on the rest of our health that soda does not (increased risk of cancer through second-hand smoke and pollution, namely).

But, if we want to use cigarette taxes as an example, let's not forget the socioeconomic impact of cigarette taxation either. The reduction in smoking that followed cigarette taxation (taxation which funded education, which shouldn't be discounted as a contributing factor in the reduction in smoking) primarily occurred within higher socioeconomic brackets. The effects were significantly more muted on the working poor and uneducated.

It's also a slippery slope. Soda is arbitrary, low-hanging fruit. Juice isn't much better. Neither are potato chips, or french fries, or sandwich cookies, or sugared cereals. You can tax them all, and you're only going to hurt the lower class without providing viable substitutes.

If the politicians want to rally behind a progressive, rather than regressive, food-based cause, then tax red meat, which has a far worse effect on the environment than soda.

Otherwise, save your energy, fight against income inequality and food deserts, and let the damn working class have their sustenance/vices without playing arrogant nanny and taking even more money out of their pockets.

[Tacachale]

^I wouldn't worry about it anyway, there's no actual proposed legislation. It's just a study done about how much revenue it would make and what effect it would have.

[BridgeTroll]

If you want to depress the sales of something, tax it.

And incidentally, the tax on cigarettes also pays for a pretty massive anti smoking campaign.

Fewer than 15% of Americans smoke tobacco now.  Pretty good considering where we were 30 years ago, when you smoked second hand cigarettes even if you didn't smoke because it was literally everywhere.

http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/only-15-percent-u-s-adults-now-smoke-cdc-finds-n579646

Smoking is the nation's leading cause of preventable illness, causing more than 480,000 deaths each year in the United States, the CDC estimates.

Why the smoking rate fell so much in 2015 — and whether it will fall as fast again — is not quite clear.

About 50 years ago, roughly 42 percent of U.S. adults smoked. It was common nearly everywhere — in office buildings, restaurants, airplanes and even hospitals. The smoking rate's gradual decline has coincided with an increased public understanding that smoking is a cause of cancer, heart disease and other lethal health problems.

Experts attribute recent declines decline to the mounting impact of anti-smoking advertising campaigns, cigarette taxes and smoking bans.

Does this hold for income and corporate?

[coredumped]

I don't know about the correlation - I think it would be hard to prove either way, people are more educated on just how bad smoking is (though it's good they use the taxes for education).
Just like the consumption of soda is already at a 30 year low:
http://fortune.com/2016/03/29/soda-sales-drop-11th-year/
Before any of these nanny-state taxes.

Either way, do we really need another tax on something to tell us how to live? Ridiculous.

[BridgeTroll]

I don't know about the correlation - I think it would be hard to prove either way, people are more educated on just how bad smoking is (though it's good they use the taxes for education).
Just like the consumption of soda is already at a 30 year low:
http://fortune.com/2016/03/29/soda-sales-drop-11th-year/
Before any of these nanny-state taxes.

Either way, do we really need another tax on something to tell us how to live? Ridiculous.

Maybe the government just wants the income...

[Non-RedNeck Westsider]

So are we talking all soda or just prepackaged soda?

Does soda water fall under this?

What about baking soda?

Is there a sugar 'threshold'?

This is dumb.

[Tacachale]

I don't know about the correlation - I think it would be hard to prove either way, people are more educated on just how bad smoking is (though it's good they use the taxes for education).
Just like the consumption of soda is already at a 30 year low:
http://fortune.com/2016/03/29/soda-sales-drop-11th-year/
Before any of these nanny-state taxes.

Either way, do we really need another tax on something to tell us how to live? Ridiculous.

This link I gave was to a study of cigarette companies' internal documents, which showed that the companies knew the price increases badly hurt their sales. And of course, people are more educated largely because the tax revenues were put toward educating them. Before that, it was difficult to counter the companies' marketing campaigns and the misleading research they orchestrated, not to mention the addictive nature of the product.

There are a lot of similarities between how the sugar industry operates now, and how cigarette companies operated in the past.

[Adam White]

I don't know about the correlation - I think it would be hard to prove either way, people are more educated on just how bad smoking is (though it's good they use the taxes for education).
Just like the consumption of soda is already at a 30 year low:
http://fortune.com/2016/03/29/soda-sales-drop-11th-year/
Before any of these nanny-state taxes.

Either way, do we really need another tax on something to tell us how to live? Ridiculous.

Nanny state? I think not. Trying to reduce the cost borne by the taxpayer through treating unhealthy people isn't the "nanny state" at work - it's actually the sort of things Republicans and Libertarians and the like would totally agree with if it were anything else. It's good business.

Yes, it's your business to live how you want. But when you rely on the rest of us to pay for your destructive behaviour, it's no longer simply a personal decision.

But all that aside - as I mentioned before, the better way to deal with this is to address the sugar that goes into the food in the first place. Not tax the end user.