Instead of a sugary drinks tax, how about ending corn subsidies that cause high fructose corn syrup to be so cheap? That would naturally cause soda to be more expensive
This is Monash U in Australia and seems pretty explicitly focused on the Australian context. Maybe corn is as subsidized there as it is in the states but a cursory search makes me skeptical. At any rate, this forum does attract a fairly international readership, but if we wanted a US-centric study we could maybe look at the long term outcomes from cities that have levied taxes (nothing state level it seems like), such as this study in Oakland, CA: https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/jo...
I suppose we'd see something similar on a broader scale w/ a reduction in subsidies, but in terms of knock on effects and scale they're not _too_ comparable (i.e. SSBs are a single product, corn in general goes into a lot of different products, etc)
1) The profit margin on soda is massive, and HFCS is only a small portion of the cost.
2) What corn subsidies? We are talking about Australia. I am no expert in Australian economics, nor agricultural policy, but my understanding after a bit of searching is that they do not subsidize corn
You could argue that the US subsidy is effecting Australia through the global market. However, to the extent that this is relevent, Australia'a recourse would be a tarif on such products entering the market; at which point you might as well tax that which you want to discourage.
3) The problem is not high fructose corn syrup. It is sugar water. Granted, the exact composition of the sugar does have some effect. For a given amount of sugar, excess free fructose is probably worse for you than roughly equal proportions of fructose and glucose. Having said that, fructose tastes sweater for a given amount of sugar. So I'm not sure how it plays out in general.
Having said that, according to the FDA, HFCS is either 42% or 55% fructose, which is lower than I would expect. (Actually. HFCS-42 sounds like low fructose. Most natural food has a 50-50 split.).
I don't know exact numbers, but AFAIK even if HFCS will be 10x more expensive it will not increase drink price significantly because each can/bottle contains only a small (but still unhealthy) amount of it (and raw ingredients only a fraction of cost to begin with).
I had to cut out all corn syrup due to a freak corn allergy that went from a nuisance to all over hives in early 2021. What surprised me most is that my cravings for sugary snacks/drinks is now virtually zero.
Pigouvian taxes are the best taxes. Externalities? Those cost money now! Want less of a behaviour? Put a tax on it! Want to reduce your tax burden? Do less of the bad thing!
"But I don't want to stop doing the bad thing!" That's fine! You can keep doing it. It just costs money now.
"But that's unfair!" Is it? The societal goal is to reduce the bad thing. We don't want to ban it outright, and some kind of regulatory framework sounds complicated and expensive. This is the easiest and cheapest (from the government's perspective) way of reducing the bad thing.
"People are going to just keep doing the bad thing anyway!" What an opportunity to raise the price! Sounds like extra money for roads, schools, and parks. Or maybe a chance to reduce reliance on other taxes.
I think there are at least two problems with this argument.
The first is a classic —- if your tax base requires money made from a vice, you’ve got a stream of money which either requires that the vice continues to exist, or else a stream of money which you hope to lose in the in future.
The second is a bit more basic. Who gets to decide what he vices are?
I'm all for a sugar tax, but I am fully aware that drawing lines is going to be difficult, you should be too, and it seems like a weird problem to gloss over because it's clearly the big problem here. What do we do with artificial sweeteners? I'm sure there will be vocal contingents saying we obviously should/shouldn't sin tax them. What about LaCroix? Same. I think the answer is obviously shouldn't/shouldn't, but I know people who get shouty because their fad micronutrient of the month isn't aggressively marketed by the FDA. It is possible to go too far: I grew up in a house that omitted salt from its cooking to a degree that I would now say constitutes a food crime, even though I'd fully agree that most prepared food errs on the side of too much salt. In any case, I fully expect that unless we exercise extreme restraint on this road, it won't be very long at all before someone will try to twist my arm into a dietary choice that I consider gross, insane, and completely detached from evidence-based reality.
Sounds like a good way for me to never vote for you and your nanny party, and to become more likely to support extremist parties if you end up getting enough votes anyway.
And examples of a sugar tax working as intended exist today. The beverage choices available at a convenience store in London are drastically different than what is available at my local store here in the states. The majority of space is given to lightly flavored waters. Some of the difference is potentially a difference in preference, but even the US style sodas contain far less sugar (and in my opinion taste better).
A prime example of a "health tax" such as this is the Scottish Nationalist Party's tax on alcohol - in a bid to increase health by putting a minimum pricing on alcoholic beverages.
The result? Nothing has changed, there is still the same amount of health problems in Scotland caused by alcohol.
Sugar taxes have also been proposed in the UK, and heavily combated.
It just will not work.
The best you can do is to highlight how bad sugar is to health in general, and hope it influences people to change their habits - I for one try to reduce my sugar intake whenever possible.
> A prime example of a "health tax" such as this is the Scottish Nationalist Party's tax on alcohol - in a bid to increase health by putting a minimum pricing on alcoholic beverages.
> The result? Nothing has changed, there is still the same amount of health problems in Scotland caused by alcohol.
"Scotland’s minimum pricing linked to 13% drop in alcohol-related deaths, study finds
Experts say research provides clear evidence minimum unit pricing has reduced harm caused by alcohol
Scotland’s pioneering policy of minimum pricing for alcohol has been linked to a 13% drop in the number of deaths from alcohol consumption, and hundreds fewer hospitalisations, according to a study.
The research was observational, so cannot prove conclusively that the significant fall in deaths was due to the minimum unit pricing policy.
However, experts said the study provided the clearest signal to date that the policy had reduced the harm caused by alcohol in Scotland, and added to a large and consistent evidence base on the effectiveness of alcohol pricing action."
"The study found that, since MUP was introduced in May 2018, there has been no change in the proportion of harmful drinkers. A small drop of 3.2 units per week in their consumption was “not robust” and disappeared when adjusted for the introduction of Universal Credit, which changed the regularity of benefit payments."
"Results: There was no significant change in the proportion of drinkers consuming at harmful levels (β = +0.6 percentage points; 95% confidence interval [CI] = −1.1, +2.3) or moderate levels (β = +1.4 percentage points; 95% confidence interval = −1.1, +3.8) after the introduction of MUP. The proportion consuming at hazardous levels fell significantly by 3.5 percentage points (95% CI = −5.4, −1.7). There were no significant changes in other secondary outcomes or in the subgroup analyses after correction for multiple testing.
Conclusions: Introducing MUP in Scotland was not associated with reductions in the proportion of drinkers consuming at harmful levels but did reduce the prevalence of hazardous drinking. This adds to previous evidence that MUP reduced overall alcohol consumption in Scotland and consumption among those drinking above moderate levels."
"Further research that would strengthen understanding of the impact of MUP on people drinking at harmful levels include studies of alcohol-related harm. Such analyses have recently been published, showing a 13.4% reduction in alcohol-attributable deaths and a 4.1% reduction in alcohol-attributable hospitalisations in Scotland. This provides the most direct evidence on the public health impact of MUP to date."
Thats assuming that the higher alcohol prices have not caused people to spend more on alcohol and less on things like food or necessities for their families or turned to other sources of alcohol (homebrewed and therefore more dangerous).
> The best you can do is to highlight how bad sugar is to health in general, and hope it influences people to change their habits
We've been trying that for years and it's clearly not working. Obesity, diabetes, pre-diabetes, heart disease, diseases of chronic inflammation, etc are all at epidemic levels.
Humans aren't perfect automatons that will make perfect choices if given information. We develop addictions, we prioritize the short-term over the long-term, we get tired and choose what's easy and available.
We should align incentives to better outcomes. We restrict alcohol and nicotine and opioids. Taking steps to reduce the societal harm of sugar is a good thing for society.
> Humans aren't perfect automatons that will make perfect choices if given information.
And yet, somehow, they will rationally conclude the best financial course to take is to realign to making healthier choices instead of switching to dollar-store sodas or making their own sugary drinks.
I think that most people wish to just carry on their lives without interference from nanny-state lovers who just LOVE to dictate to others how they should live their lives.
Seriously, fuck that nonsense. If I choose to lead an unhealthy lifestyle, that' should be my choice - not to be dictated to by "those who know better". Note that I personally choose to minimise the amount of sugar I take. I may also even tut-tut at those whom choose to take all the sugar they want - but what I won't do is waggle fingers at them, nor do I want to utilise taxation - a very, very overused excuse by govts. to rake in more dosh - to discourage people from what "those who know better" want them to be like.
No. real solutions lie in getting manufacturers to reduce sugar and especially HFCS as ingredients in their products. Quite possibly not much can be done about cakes and confectionary in terms of sugar, but there sure is an awful lot of sugar in a lot of other food products.
Abstract: "The[] findings suggest that SSB [sugar-sweetened beverage] taxes may work as intended in reducing demand for SSBs through higher prices, yet further research is needed to understand their associations with diet and health outcomes and heterogeneity of consumer responses."
I am ready to believe that drinking less SSB has a positive impact on my health. Looking forward to solid results proving or disproving that.
In the US, I think making soda expensive enough that bundling 32oz of it for an extra $0.75 with fast-food combo meals stopped happening, and free refills became uncommon again (they were rare as recently as the early 90s! You paid per cup, or you bought a pitcher, like beer!) would probably do some good.
> The result? Nothing has changed, there is still the same amount of health problems in Scotland caused by alcohol.
Actually, no.
The price of alcoholic drinks that you and I would buy hasn't changed a bit. Pub prices haven't changed, because they weren't affected by this law. Retail prices in supermarkets haven't changed a bit. Well, that's not quite true, they've gone up but only at the same rate as everything else.
Pikey cider and various "vodka-style spirit drinks" made from food-grade industrial ethanol and synthetic flavourings have pretty much disappeared from sale. Before Minimum Unit Pricing - which sets the minimum price that retail outlets can sell alcoholic drinks at to 50p per unit of alcohol - it was possible to buy a 3 litre bottle of 8% "cider flavour alcoholic drink" for about three quid. That's essentially been priced out of the market, because no-one wants to pay nearly a tenner for a bottle of windscreen washer fluid without the detergent in.
MUP has not affected the price of "normal" drinks, because let's face it, £1 minimum for a can of beer or £5 for a bottle of wine is already on the cheap end of things.
Since MUP came in, deaths from alcohol-related illness has dropped by about 15%, and in the first year alone alcohol-related deaths (that's illness, accidents, fires, misadventure, etc) dropped by 10%.
More people with alcohol problems are seeking help. Fewer young people - the people who the pound-a-litre pikey cider is marketed to - are drinking underage, and those who are, are drinking less.
While there were fanciful tales in the newspapers that alcoholic drinks would be so expensive in Scotland that people would drive to England to load up with cheaper booze and drive back with it, it turns out that no-one really cares that much. Anyone who has the resources for the "booze cruises" that the trashy tabloids describe probably isn't buying anything affected by Minimum Unit Pricing anyway.
In general, MUP has been a resounding success. It's worked so well that Ireland are now doing it too.
"equity" is being used as though it's a magic key word and as though it's not the road to hell. Is it getting confused with "equality"?
Equality: Equal opportunity, everyone treated the same
Equity: Equal outcomes, people treated differently in order to achieve equity
The only way you get equity is through extreme top down authoritarian control and force. Think about what you'd have to do to enforce equity with one's own relatives, or even brothers and sisters, let alone society wide.
Where does the money go? If it goes into the general fund and gets to be large enough, then government programs become dependent on it. The funds start to dry up if people actually stop engaging in the behavior. Then the government starts running low on funds they were dependent on.
I've always thought that these kinds of "vice taxes" shouldn't go into the general fund. They should go toward things that are related to helping the cause. In this case, the funds could go into awareness programs, subsidies for healthy foods, etc.
This something I can get onboard with. It’s been like an Overton window of the palate. Things have gotten sweeter and sweeter over time. We need to claw that back so that our taste buds will relearn how to appreciate a small amount of sweetener instead of needing to be overwhelmed to just taste it.
We have a sugar tax in Seattle. The primary opponents were fast food places. End result: the $1.50 hot dog and a soda combo at costco comes with diet soda now, so I no longer get it. Aside from that, I'm drinking as much soda as I ever did, I just have less money ¯\_(-_-)_/¯
It was a time, to be sure. I remember hearing the ads in favor of the tax (something like a grandmother worrying about her grandchildren drinking too many sodie pops), and as soon as they came they disappeared.
I suppose the counter to that is that you could drink oil, but that is a bit unrealistic.
Something to consider is that not all fresh foods are equal. Lettuce is way healthier and cheaper than imported raspberries that need to be basically overnighted to maintain freshness.
Seems like eating healthy is an education problem. Although even as myself, who I consider educated in the manner, I find myself overeating healthy foods out of hedonism and putting on weight.
There's also the convenience issue. If you work multiple low skill jobs just to make ends meet, you might not have the time to turn fresh produce into a meal. If you're trying to limit yourself to foods that require limited/no preparation and are cheap, you do end up getting a lot of unhealthy options that fill that niche.
You can get around this. I've personally spent years of my life eating just rice and beans with a bag of frozen vegetables. You can get a really low priced rice cooker ($20-30) that you can spend <1 minute setting up (it'll steam the veggies while it cooks the rice) and then let it run while you're in the shower or doing something else. In the end you get a reasonably health albeit bland meal with less time spent prepping than actually eating. I get why it starts to make sense to just grab a $5 burrito at taco bell as a meal when you're rushing to your second job though.
From what I saw of American supermarkets and fast food places the various times I've visited (where the healthy stuff in supermarkets was priced like a good restaurant while the fast food was priced cheaper than the nominal cost of my school meals in the UK 15-20 years prior), and how much it differs from British and German equivalents (which do also have junk food, but you can easily eat healthy), I can say for certain that healthy eating doesn't have to be expensive, and when it is expensive that's something that needs to be fixed.
Yes? If unhealthy foods are inexpensive and healthy foods are expensive, taxing unhealthy foods removes some economic pressure to consume unhealthy foods.
The comments suggesting people would just decide to have fewer sugary drinks to save money seem to be forgetting how humans act when something they like is made less available. It will be a wake-up call to exactly no one. Cheaper brand-X sodas would fill the void left by more expensive ones, enterprising individuals might even make their own sodas or switch to lemonade, etc. The perceived scarcity might even lead more people who don't normally drink soda to start.
I'd think that incentivizing the proliferation of taste-alike low/no-sugar sodas would have a much better outcome anyways. Tax credits to businesses that adequately serve and promote low-sugar sodas could be a good start.
Seattle has such a tax. It has done nothing to stop people from purchasing that foul stuff, however. They simply go to a neighbouring city and purchase it there - for less.
Although my understanding of economics supports taxation as a mechanism of changing behavior (marginal changes in the economic jargon not meaning "minimal"), my understanding is that cigarette taxes haven't had much effect changing behavior, possibly because of addiction, possibly because the taxes aren't high enough.
There's also the complication that the excise taxes become a recurring source of revenue, causing a new addiction.
We already have a realworld example of this with cigarettes.
It doesn't work. Half of my neighbors sit outside and constantly smoke, regardless of the danger, regardless of the constant warnings, regardless of the tremendous expense via taxes.
And the tax never makes it back into healthcare, it's abused by politicians.
You want to end bad self-destructive behavior? Give people an education and motivation into giving a damn about their own bodies.
I use to be pretty libertarian in my views on sugary drink and fast food taxes ... but at this point, its a major blight on society and people truly can't help themselves. My spouse works in healthcare and often is involved in caring for diabetes patients - they literally pick soda and sweets over limbs. They'd rather consume mountain dew and ice cream vs keeping their arms and legs. Even when doctors prevent food/drink orders with sugary crap, their friends/family bring in more garbage. The number of obese people walking around and density of fast food places in urban areas is utterly disgusting. Explore around google maps in big urban areas, or even small ones - you can easily find 20-30 fast food places in towns of less than 30k people. Easy property tax revenue I guess?
This general pattern is so dangerous, politically. Using taxes to shape behavior opens up a potentially very invasive, nanny-like attitude towards individuals, and ultimately codifying what is vice and what is virtue in law. The slippery slope here is obvious: fining people for not going to the gym enough, a screen tax to curb excessive computer usage, etc. But ultimately the issue is a combination of hubris and distrust: hubris because you have to think you know best to implement these policies, and distrust because you take that decision away from individuals. (And don't get me wrong, THAT argument is also abused by providers of outright poisonous products. I'm arguing for deep reluctance to do things like this rather than the libertarian position of never doing it.)
Individuals are already subject to a very invasive, predator-like attitude, courtesy of corporations for whom a higher market cap is the only key metric, and the long-term impact on public health is a minor concern. We're already sliding down very fast down the private equity slippery slope.
Do you mean to suggest adding another predator would address the first? That somehow, because there's a legal writ behind it, it makes it any more morally right?
I'm defending the need for a nanny-like actor, under public oversight, and with opposite financial incentives to reduce healthcare expenditure by improving public health.
What about the opposite of paying higher taxes and health insurance premiums because you have to pay for other people’s type 2 diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease?
Surely, those subsidies shape behavior just as much as a tax shapes behavior.
Poor people can least afford to deal with the related health issues.
It’s not like there are mustache-twirling villains coming up with ways to punch down even harder here. Diets high in sugar are more likely to lead to painful and even dangerous oral health issues, pancreatic/kidney/liver issues, diabetes, and obesity with all of its knock on effects.
It only has a negative effect for people who will never reduce the sugar in their diet, and those are the people who should be paying into socialized healthcare at a higher rate because they’ll need lots of benefits later. So really they’re saving to take care of themselves, making this a net positive long term.
I know it’s harder than “just stop eating sugar” but feelings or preferences don’t change the facts of biochemistry. Until you can disprove the findings, the policy should reflect the state of the science.
And by all means find more/better ways to incentivize or even subsidize healthier options for those on the low end of the socioeconomic ladder. That is absolutely one of the things taxes like this should fund.
I worked for a sugar drink company for over a decade in the poorest neighborhoods.
They won't even notice the tax. They'll still buy the product. They'll just have less money to spend in other areas.
But by all means push another tax on people who can least afford it.
People who ask for this should be ignored in a free society. Please move to some place where authoritarian leadership tells you what to think daily and allow us independent people with self-discipline to thrive.
Edited because it did not convey my actual feelings on the topic, just a heated rant I corrected
> People who ask for this should be ignored in a free society. Please move to some place where authoritarian leadership tells you what to think daily and allow is independent people with self-discipline to thrive.
> Edited because it did not convey my actual feelings on the topic, just a heated rant I corrected
I don't know what this looked like before the edit, but it's still just a heated rant.
yes -- these authoritarians are causing problems in our society. we simply need to root them out and expel them all, then we the people could live in peace in a society free from authoritarianism...
You use evocative imagery to make an emotional, slippery-slope argument, but if by “putting a gun to Coke’s head and pulling the trigger” you mean reducing the profitability of a business that thrives by sewing seeds that will eventually blossom into negative outcomes for people, and fining them for any noncompliance with regulations, well then just let me know when you want to go for target practice!
