Ice Cold Taxation

15Oct09

If you are not free to choose wrongly and irresponsibly, you are not free at all. – Jacob Hornberger

Obesity is epidemic. No other factor has had so great an impact on America's rising health care costs as the portliness of her citizens, and the nanny state has taken notice. They want to force people into better choices in much the same way they did smokers, by taxing "junk" food, beginning with soda.

The House Ways and Means Committee has proposed a tax of ten cents on each can of soda, to help fund the government option.

Harold Goldstein is the executive director of the California Center for Public Health Advocacy. He says it has to be taxed so the beverage industry pays its share for the obesity epidemic.

"This study that we did with UCLA showed that regardless of income or ethnicity, adults who drink one or more soda a day are 27 percent more likely to be overweight or obese," Goldstein says.

While I'm sure this data holds true, I'd find any claim of a causative effect to be suspect.

The 1999-2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey by the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition showed no correlation between the number of calories consumed in sweetened drinks and obesity. In reality healthy weight people drink more beverages containing sugar than overweight people.

The definitions seems poorly defined as well, covering soda, sports drinks, and other sugary beverages. As soon as you add sugar to water you owe the government some money. What if I make sweet tea in my kitchen, are the revenuers going to come knocking on my back door?

What if I choose to drink diet soda, which doesn't have any sugar? Are they going to tax that? Soon they'd be taxing all caffeinated beverages and you'd have an angry populace on your hands. Taxes like this punish even those who practice moderation, and like smoking taxes will disproportionately affect the poor.

American Beverage Association spokesman Kevin Keane says comparisons to taxes on tobacco are a poor analogy. "You can have a soft drink and be a healthy person," says Keane. "You can't say the same about smoking."

Historically increased taxation has created lower sales and demand, which in turn causes industry to decrease production, and put people out of work.

"We have some economic data that shows there'd be $22 billion lost in economic output," Keane says.

I wonder what these politicians think is more important, being a few pounds lighter, or having a job? Given Washington's penchant for taxation, you can be sure it wouldn't stop at soda. It will be salt and red meat next.

Go to FreedomWorks and join their email campaign to stop this regressive tax from becoming law.