Comments on: Taxing Sweet Drinks

By: allen tucker

allen tucker — Thu, 14 May 2009 14:25:08 +0000

If Gov is so concerned with our health
and wants to discourage us from drinking sugar, then why not just drop the cuurent sales tax on diet drinks. Wouldn’t this encourage us to drink diet and on the other hand save them money they spend on obese people. Do you think Gov would even consider this. No, Gov wants to tap into the big money of soft drinks and have more money and more money to spend spend spend.

By: Shari

Shari — Sat, 09 May 2009 16:32:17 +0000

Great posts – I’m impressed! Glad to see there is still common sense and freedom loving people out there.

By: alex

alex — Tue, 05 May 2009 09:41:44 +0000

Interesting programme in the UK the other day ‘professor Reagan’s nursery’ which took an objective look at various childrens products. Regarding breakfast cereal, a Kellogg’s spokeperson said “there is absolutely no link between sugar and obesity” and there are studies linking breakfast – of any kind – to increased cognitive performance at school. therefore sugary cereals were accepted by professor Reagan as being part of a good children’s lifestyle.

If I hadn’t hard of the primal diet I would have accepted what i see on good programmes like this; average people don’t have time to validate everything they see int he medi with scientific research but must accept it at face value.

watch here for the next 7 days if you are in the UK: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00k7976/Professor_Regans…_Nursery/

By: Tray

Tray — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 21:28:53 +0000

Here’s a novel idea…instead of making excuses for the government needing more money for this and that, how about the government operating within their budget. Everyone I know has one and is required to stay w/in it since we (private citizens) cannot deficit spend. The gov’t has absolutely no business legislating this garbage and yet we allow them to overstep their bounds constantly. Just because they don’t want to regulate your favorite “vice” is no reaason to allow or support this. Remember, the other side of the “personal liberty” coin is “personal responsibilty”. Got freedom? – Don’t think so!

By: Gary

Gary — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 18:16:55 +0000

When has our government shown any sense of responsibility for spending taxation dollars directly on the supposed cause it legislated itself for? Look at programs like the Lottery, etc. where such a small overall percentage actually goes to the education needs of the general child population. Huge amounts are dedicated to “administration, marketing, etc.”.

Where is the positive trickle down effect from the Federal bank bailouts in regard to the general public? You’d be amazed how many “financial sweeteners” can be in a typical pork barrel program.

By: Philip Mancini

Philip Mancini — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 18:14:19 +0000

Taxing sweet drinks is absolutely ludicrous!!! If the Federal Government simply stopped subsidizing the corn industry we wouldn’t be in this mess. Taxing sweet drinks is essentially taxing high fructose corn syrup, which the government subsidizes.

Come on people!!!

By: Raeann

Raeann — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 19:25:53 +0000

Our society thinks we can have our cake and free health care too! News Flash that’s not working!

We can’t have it both ways, either regulate health from start to finish, or let everyone fend for themselves. It’s not that complicated, we can have a society of healthy people with affordable health care, or we can have a society plagued by unhealthy people and impossible healthcare. But don’t fight regulation and then complain cause we have to share the burden.

By: Trinkwasser

Trinkwasser — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 17:55:31 +0000

I’m with pretty much everyone from Mike M to Nicholas Hahn.

First off it won’t change much, Joe Public will simply wash down their starch sandwiches on toast with Healthy fruit juice, which IMO will make little difference

http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/search?q=fructose

If it works they’ll be looking for other things to tax which will be sat fats. I predict this will happen in the UK first

http://www.fsascience.net/2009/02/10/the_appliance_of_science

http://www.nhs.uk/Change4Life/Pages/default.aspx

http://www.satfatnav.com/

note the sponsors for the latter two sites and crosscheck with the sponsors of the ADA, AHA, Diabetes UK etc.

Meanwhile

http://thisiswhyyourefat.com/

By: NIcholas Hahn

NIcholas Hahn — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 03:43:12 +0000

When you give generally know-nothing government officials the power to tax foods the find inconvenient or dangerous, you give them the power to tax and ban virtually anything based on the logic that persuasive evidence compels them to protect the individual. I live a primal lifestyle. I IF, do functional exercise, and generally abstain from neolithic foods as much as possible. These ideas didn’t come from the government, but from free commerce and discussion.

However, every now and then, I do like junk food, like a glass of wine, or a rum and coke. You’d be hard pressed to convince anyone that the largely unhealthy, grain eating mass of politicians know more about my health and my well-being than me. And I’d rather not fund their willy-nilly campaigns with my taxes that I could spend on grass-fed beef.

They’d probably take the 18% tax and give it to farmers to feed corn to their cows, make another version of a propagandizing Food Pyramid, or give it to researchers to find yet another way to transform soy into a food-like product. Better yet, next time they’ll pass a measure to outlaw raw milk on the grounds that it is high fat, or they’ll ban red meat on the grounds of “compelling research” that it is associated with cancer.

By: Ruth

Ruth — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 17:57:00 +0000

I think I have a compromise position: Don’t pass the tax onto individuals, pass it along to the big corporations that push sugar and refined carbs. While I’m somewhat concerned about the “slippery” slope, I’m thinking/hoping that it is easier to tax packaged foods than real foods.

I also think companies like Nestle should be taxed more for the mess they are creating with bottled water. What a crock!