Soda Taxes...

[Terry K]

(The view expressed here is solely that of the founder and owner of STS, and does not reflect anyone's views other than his own)

The government is pondering a tax on sodas to 'curb obesity'. This is totally the wrong approach.

Coke & Pepsi have both been in business for over 100 years and its NOW they're causing obesity? I missed a memo.

Some of us have no interest or desire at all in diet sodas. I do not drink them because of the taste factor. Then there's the people who are allergic to Diet Soda. (Yes you can be allergic to the sweeteners used in them)

If the government wants to be serious about curbing obesity, start with banning or heavily taxing drive thru windows. Nothing irritates me more than people whining about how bad fast food is but refusing to get out of their cars and *gasp* walking into a place to get food. Recently a woman in Oregon complained a fast food place wouldn't serve her because she was on a bicycle. Okay that's pot calling kettle black. IF you're using a bicycle to live a healthier lifestyle, going to a drive thru window makes ZERO sense.

Put the obesity causing foods in the back of the Mega Grocery stores. If you force people to exercise a bit to get to them, you curb part of the problem.

Let's look at HOW we're treating obesity. Handing out scooters from those people on TV who push them like candy isn't curing the problem. If you're obese, get some exercise. That's the first step, not into your new scooter from some guy on TV.

The Soda companies are doing their part offering alternatives that are either diet or reduced sweeteners, or even new categories of beverages that are healthier.

Congress needs to do its part by fixing health care. Get those blue pill ads, scooter ads, diabetic testing ads, and other medications off my TV. Those ads aren't cheap and alot of times they're causing visits to the Doctor that aren't necessary. While they are at it, let's also put the personal injury attorneys on notice that collecting settlements of more money than a person can spend in a lifetime is NOT helping things. (Driving health care costs down is critical in dealing with obesity)

There is NO one fix to obesity. Its a team effort. Congress, do your part then talk to me about taxing my Dr Pepper.

[morbious_fod]

I was wondering when this would get posted on here. I also notice that like quite a few in this country you are fine if fat people are singled out, so long as the government doesn't tax your particular vice. Obesity is a problem in this country; however, what I don't like is that the same demonizing tactics that were used on smokers are now starting to be applied to fat people now. The core problem is there are a certain element in society who feel it is their right and obligation to dictate to the rest of the country how to live their own lives. These people have existed since man started to think for itself. They in their self righteousness feel that they have all the answers to the world's problems, and that anyone who doesn't agree or conform should be made to.

Their tactic will be the same as it was with smokers, tax the least impactful thing that you can, in this case it will be soda, then when that tax is accepted, move on to bigger things. The reason they didn't go after fast food or fating foods was that they would be seen as taxing a staple of life, food, which wouldn't look good at all, but don't worry like a cancer grows so will these sin taxes. The thing that the people who think that attacking these "bad behaviors" never seem to get through their head, or ask themselves is after they succeed, with my complacency, in doing this how long will it be before they come after something I like. There's always someone who thinks something that you are doing disrupts their life somehow, and when we empower them with the ability to infringe upon the lives of others, not matter how logical that infringement may seem to us on the surface, we empower them to dictate whatever they want. Sooner or later they will come for you.

I too look a these people riding around on their scooters and think to myself, you know if you would walk instead of ride maybe you would lose some of that; however, I clamp my mouth shut and allow them to live their lives as they see fit. I only have the right to control my own life. If they want to kill themselves then I don't have a right or a moral obligation to stop them. They have the freedom to be idiots, that's what makes this country great.
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My new website chronicling the soda bottling companies of the Southwest Virginia or Northeast Tennessee area www.tazewell-orange.com

[Terry K]

[TheConnieVandelayShow]

I'm not going to say anything here because I'm fat.
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Anita
[Unfortunately Connie Vandelay is not my real name]

[morbious_fod]

[teamtitan512]

The thing I think so few people realize is that the main expenditure by the drug companies is not research & development or operating facilities, it's hiring ad execs, celebrities for endorsements, and all the equipment it takes to make fancy ads on Madison Ave.

The problem with drug prices being so inflated as compared to the rest of the world is because we allow these ads. They don't in Canada and many other countries. And yet some lawmakers want to buy Canadian drugs, also regulated on price, instead of fixing the real problem at home.

Could it be where the money comes from? Guess who funds the campaigns of the congressman and senators? You guessed it. And it's exactly why a certain few (coughs Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus of Montana) are obstructing any meaningful healthcare reform, which results in proposals like soft drink taxes that are counterproductive and draconian.

As for drive-thrus, I don't think banning them is something these guys are going to like considering the majority of MCD's/BK business comes through them, but I don't understand their appeal. They generally take longer, you factor in the cost of running the car, and they have no incentive for order accuracy. Don't forget that you then either have to eat in a car uncomfortably where many sandwiches aren't made for well, or drive it home where the food gets colder and doesn't taste as good. I always go inside for fast food unless forced to at night when some places go drive-thru only, but I don't see the appeal in the marketplace.

The problem I have with using terms like obesity causing foods is that we don't have an understanding of what really is bad at all. The problem is we're so inundated with mixed messages, with advertising not based on information but on paranoia to sell more expensive products largely (Organics and so-called natural foods are nothing more than a legalized ponzi scheme of extortion). Also there's inconclusive evidence on just how much obesity is a factor to poor health, and in some cases, it's suggested that our continued scaling back of ideal weights and body mass indices are actually making us less healthy.

Yes, our country is fatter than it's ever been, and that's not necessarily a good thing. The problem is we're generally lazier than we've ever been, and that's more concerning on a grand scale because the once proud and great thing we built here seems to be fading, but that's a tangent for another day and time.

[morbious_fod]

I know what you mean about the sheer amount of time and money spend on hocking drugs in the media. I have also noticed that this has led the creation of new diseases which they also advertise like restless leg syndrome, and of course they have a little pill you can take that will solve all your problems. I have been doing a lot of research in the local newspapers from the turn of the century and I have noticed that there hasn't been this much emphasis on the advertising of drugs of this saturation since the early 1900's when patent medicines were all the rage.

We have become a nation of pill popping zombies. Are you depressed? Then you have a disease and this pill, even though it won't cure the ailment, will make you feel better about your crappy life, which is most likely the actual cause of your depression. Is your kid bored with a school system that increasingly refuses to truly engage them only to cater to the lowest common dumbnominator? Give them a pill that will sedate that overactive mind and make them just as manageable as the dumber members of the class.

There are many factors which has led to the obesity rate in this country, the largest of which is that we have gone from a manufacturing based economy to a service based one. Back in the early to mid Twentieth Century we had a majority of actual labor intensive jobs in this country which helped people get the proper amount of exercise. Usually your office workers, and administrators of these companies were the fat ones while the basic assembly line worker was much healthier. We have sent more and more of those basic laborer jobs out of the country and replaced them with more office jobs, and even the office jobs have become more sedentary. Before if you wanted a particular invoice or paper you had to at least get up and get it from the filing cabinet, now all you have to do is pull it up on the computer and shoot it to the printer.

Then you ad in the ever increasing wel-fare rolls where we have a huge segment of our population sitting around eating Cheetos and watching television. As a society we have become more sedimentary not necessary because we all are rich fat and lazy, but because what was keeping the people in the past thin no longer exists, and I'm sorry after a ten hour day of slogging away at a computer trying to keep my company operational, I don't feel like coming home and becoming a hamster. I would imagine that many others also have more important obligations to family or some other aspect of their lives as well, and going out for a run is the last thing on their minds.

The work is less labor intensive the hours are longer, and other obligations take priority over getting enough exercise. I'll be the first to admit I really need to start exercising again; however, being on nightshift really doesn't give me but one option, and I really don't feel like hitting a gym for the two hours I actually have to myself after I wake up and before I go to work, but at some point I am going to have to, and I know that. Which brings me to my last point, obese people for the most part know what they have to do to be healthier, but they either don't have the time, family takes priority, or other reasons inhibit their decision to exercise.

Constantly badgering them through commercials, news stories, television programs, radio, and anything else that you can work the message into, and telling them that they are just lazy and ignorant on a daily basis really creates resentment, and in some cases outright animosity when some skinny active lifestyle addict tells them how easy it is to lose weight and how bad they are for not being like them, and how much of a burden their being overweight becomes to the healthier people in this country. I know I just want to flip those morons the bird and go get a Hardee's Monster Burger just to spite them, I usually don't because I am trying to keep my weight down, but I certainly feel like it. Fat people are the new n-word on the block, and it's easy to discriminate against them because they can change their situation, but is this constant demonization of a group of people really helping anything?
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My new website chronicling the soda bottling companies of the Southwest Virginia or Northeast Tennessee area www.tazewell-orange.com

[crass_pgga]

This was in the Washington Post back n September:

5 Myths We Need to Can About Soda Taxes


By Katherine Mangu-Ward
Sunday, September 27, 2009

Like bears to honey or zombies to brains, politicians find something irresistible about soda taxes. President Obama recently told Men's Health magazine that he thinks a "sin tax" on soda is "an idea that we should be exploring." San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom moved to impose a fee on stores for selling sugary drinks, only to admit that his plan was probably illegal. In December, New York Gov. David Paterson proposed a 18 percent tax on full-sugar soda to help cover a budget shortfall. After a public outcry, he claimed he was just raising awareness about childhood obesity. But he was also rehashing the same old myths about how taxing soda will save us all:

1. Sin taxes are for our own good.

The basic idea sounds reasonable enough. Why not have the government nudge citizens along the path to righteousness by making bad choices more expensive? But even the most avid proponents of sin taxes concede that none of the nickel-and-dime proposals on the table is large enough to discourage soda drinking. And they're not really intended to. Soda taxes, like most sin taxes, aren't primarily designed to reduce consumption -- they're designed to raise revenue. Tap water is already virtually free. Adding a few cents in tax to a $1.29 soda bottle isn't going to send cost-conscious Coke-guzzlers swarming to the nearest water fountain. Forty states currently take a bite out of sales of soda or junk food -- if anyone's addicted to soda, it's state legislatures. In the Men's Health interview, Obama focused on childhood obesity. But the Senate Finance Committee's interest in soda taxes at a hearing this spring wasn't about keeping American spawn slim; health-care reformers were salivating over the projected $24 billion in revenue that a 3-cent tax would generate over the next four years.


2. Soda is causing the obesity epidemic.

It's true that, on the whole, fat people drink more soda than skinny people. They also consume more calories overall and exercise less. So soda does help people pack on the pounds. But so does absolutely everything everyone eats. No news story about soda is complete without the scolding phrase "empty calories," yet soda consumption per capita has remained steady over the past two decades as obesity numbers have continued to rise. Weight gain is a function of calories in minus calories out. A food calorie is 4.2 kilojoules of energy, whether it comes from a bottle of orange juice, a latte or an ice-cold Coke. Cola calories are not uniquely "empty." They are not bleak, hollow shells of calories, staging tiny productions of "Waiting for Godot" in your love handles. A calorie is a calorie.

3. Soda taxes help everyone.

Even advocates of soda taxes admit that the costs will be borne disproportionately by the poor, who spend a larger percentage of their income on soda than other groups. Nonetheless, politicians continue the long tradition of taxing the wazoo out of a can of Coke while leaving upscale beverages and luxury foods sin-tax-free. Eight ounces of Naked's Mighty Mango juice ($3.79 a bottle at Whole Foods) contains slightly more sugar than the same serving of cola, while diet soft drinks have the same calorie count as water. But nationwide, fancy juices and venti mocha Frappuccinos remain almost completely untouched by sin surcharges, while a bodega bottle of Sprite brings down the wrath of the taxman. It's the silly, sugary equivalent of the distinction between the harsh sentencing guidelines for people caught with crack vs. the lenient sentencing for possessors of cocaine, its high-class cousin.

4. High-fructose corn syrup is extremely hazardous to your health.

It's the stuff that makes soda sticky sweet -- and the reason many justify a soda tax. Florida state Rep. Juan Zapata called it the "crack of sweeteners" and tried to ban it in schools in 2006. At the popular blog Slashfood, it's known as "the devil's additive." High-fructose corn syrup has been treated as the fall guy for America's obesity problem. But the hazards of cheap corn sweetener are the stuff of pseudo-scientific legend. New York University nutritionist Marion Nestle, a major proponent of soda taxes, has said of corn syrup: "It's basically no different from table sugar. . . . The body can't tell them apart." Even the head of the self-proclaimed "food police" has denounced high-fructose fear-mongering. Michael Jacobson of the Center for Science in the Public Interest tore into a 2004 scientific research report that kicked off anti-corn-syrup hysteria, saying, "The authors of this paper misunderstood chemistry, draw erroneous conclusions and have done a disservice to the public in generating this controversy."

5. Obesity is driving health-care costs up. A soda tax is just a user fee.

Should we consider soda taxes an advance payment for all those diabetes tests and emergency room visits down the road -- not to mention the cost of buying the inevitably necessary super-size MRI machines? A group of academics, state health commissioners and others take exactly that line in the pages of the New England Journal of Medicine this month, writing, "Escalating health care costs and the rising burden of diseases related to poor diet create an urgent need for solutions, thus justifying government's right to recoup costs." But there is a dangerous precedent at the root of this argument: that government can and should tax any behavior that hurts the budget's bottom line. That logic sends us down a strange road. It's just a slouch, sink and a slump to taxing remote controls, thus encouraging the fat and lazy to get a little exercise by standing up to change the channel.

All kinds of private decisions -- good and bad -- affect government spending. That doesn't give politicians the right to use taxes to push people around.

kmw@reason.com

[cansrbetter]

As with everything else in the USA we are so bent on listening to the small number of citizens complaining about something. Soda is not a health food. I repeat:SODA IS NOT A HEALTH FOOD. But it is not solely responsible for making Americans overweight. We as a society live a slow lifestyle. I've been to Italy 3 times over the last 20 years and I have never seen an obese Italian walking around. Why? Because they walk, EVERYWHERE. We did a lot of walking in Italy. Plus their diet is different from ours. We love fast food and that's the real issue. We can't tax McDonalds and Burger King. We can only try to educate the masses and hope they pay attention. We should be active but would rather watch TV. Watching TV makes you hungry. The more TV you watch, the more you'll eat. I work 2nd shift and I'm not tired when I get home. So I go downstairs and watch TV. I'll usually watch the Food Network, which makes me hungry. See, that's all it takes. Then I go to bed. Bad lifestyle and I'm guilty. I don't usually drink a soda before bed but I do have 2 cans per day. Taxing soda will not solve the problem. Diet soda isn't even that good for you. It makes you drink more and the carbonation is bad for your system. It bloats you. Smoking is bad for you and the taxes have gone up on cigarettes, but that doesn't stop people from smoking. They just buy a cheaper brand. With all the bad that's going on in the world why do they insist on penalizing us for a little comfort food. Just leave us in peace. Parents argue that burgers and fries are making their kids fat. Well, stop taking them to McDonalds and Burger King then. It's that simple.
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The Beatles and Pepsi. What a combination!

[morbious_fod]

No matter what an individual likes there will always be someone else who will not like it. The problem comes when those who don't like said something decide it is their right to regulate or prohibit the first individual from having or performing the object of their hate. What makes it worse is when they decide that their meddling and fascist ideals are justified by it being for the betterment of the first individual's health. It's too late to stop this process now, we allowed them to do this to those "evil" smokers, now they are coming for you, and tomorrow they will move on to the fast food. Whether or not this is a good thing all depends upon your own justifications.

To quote Frank Zappa, "Do what you wanna. Do what you will. Just don't mess up your neighbor's thrill." from the song The Meek Shall Inherit Nothing.
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My new website chronicling the soda bottling companies of the Southwest Virginia or Northeast Tennessee area www.tazewell-orange.com

[cansrbetter]

morbious, I can't agree more with you. We as Americans have become accustomed to having others tell us what's good and bad for us. We don't fight it anymore. We've lost the will. We just say"Whatever" and move on till the next thing is taken or taxed to the hilt. Political pressure is a bad thing when ordinary citizens can't enjoy anything in life. Soda. They're going to tax it because it's bad for you. Well, start taxing 99% of everything we enjoy because I'm sure at some point it'll be bad for us. Turn off the power plants because they emit pollutants. Stop driving your car because it ruins the air and causes havoc to the earth due to oil production. We should start living like the Pilgrims again. Unbelievable.
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The Beatles and Pepsi. What a combination!