The Fresca Rebellion

theodp writes "They can ban the Marlboros, tax the Cokes, and zone the Whoppers, says Slate's William Saletan on the subject of today's morality cops. But it's time to put the brakes on the paternalistic overreaching of the food police, Saletan argues, when they come after his editor's beloved Fresca ('there are concerns that diet beverages may increase calorie consumption by justifying consumption of other caloric foods'), which will have to be pried from his cold, dead hands. '40 states have enacted special taxes on soda or junk food. And the soda taxers are becoming ever bolder. Their latest manifesto is an article in the New England Journal of Medicine, co-authored by the health commissioner of New York City, the surgeon general of Arkansas, and several others. It declares soda fair game for government intervention (PDF) on the grounds that "market failures" in this area are causing "less-than-optimal production and consumption."' Where do we draw the line?"

Comments

taxes

[Anonymous Coward]

As an avid soda drinker, I don't have any problem with a 'soda' tax. I have much more of a problem when the government outright bans something. Keep it legal and tax it, I say. I would much rather the government got income through 'sin' taxes than through the income tax.

I'm not in favor of higher taxes in general, but I would like to shift taxes. Carbon taxes would be much more efficient than income tax, for example.

Re:taxes

[KeithJM]

Sin taxes are stupid. They allow rich people to "sin" more.

We're also talking about taxing the sins of the lower class instead of the upper class. It's fine to eat prime rib and tira misu with some cheese-coated appetizer, but a coke, fries and grilled chicken sandwich from McDonalds is a sin? Unless we're actually going to apply a "calorie density" tax (which would be a horrible idea, by the way), we're really taxing poor people sins and not rich people's sins. It's like if we had much harsher penalties for things like crack than for powdered cocaine, just because poor people tend to go with crack. Oh, wait, never mind.

Re:taxes

[DarkOx]

I still think the fairest thing is state sales tax with a very narrow classes of products and services exempt. The Federal government is to be forbidden to impose any taxes except on the states, and may only tax states based on population and or total revenue. The Federal government would be barred from taxing based on any other metrics so as to prevent the abuse of the tax code for social engineering.

The federally required tax exempt classes should something along the lines, with states premited to add other classes at their own discression:

Public transportation
motor fuel for use in passenger vehicles only
passenger vehicles up to %20 of the median income, any amount over that subject to tax
foods that is less than 30% water and do not classify primarily under fats and sugars on the food pyramid
Residential rent equal to the median rent payment, amounts over subject to tax
Residential property up to two times the media income anything over that subject to tax
Medial non cosmetic care by a licensed pysician

If you do that the system is not regressive because the lower income population spends a disproportionate amount of their income on those things. It would be up to the states to set a tax rate, as well as add or subtract additional commercial classes so as to produce enough revenue to pay their obligations to the federal government, and run their own government.

Re:taxes

[ShieldW0lf]

What do you think about capping production of milk and legislating minimum pricing for it? If that practice were to stop, I doubt you would see children drinking sugar water purchased at a 10000% markup.

Re:taxes

[apoc.famine]

Same here. I'm an oddball, and spent nine years in the "real world", making decent money, before I went back to grad school. I was used to buying nice liquor in moderate quantities, upgrading on a 2 year cycle, and eating out on a whim.
 
The last two years before I went back to school, I realized that I'd be losing well over 50% of my income by doing so. I got my ass in gear, and started churning out cheap dinners which could turn into "lunch for two days", and collected a bunch of good and cheap ideas for eating in.
 
So far, I'm +$400 on my first month of grad pay, despite spending in the area of $200 on beer, booze, and bar hopping. My food budget is in the same neighborhood, and I'm eating like a king. I found a bunch of frozen single-serving salmon fillets, on sale for $1 each. Pair those with some fresh vegis and some nice rice, and you've got a fantastic meal. On-sale boneless chicken breasts and thighs, some peppers and onions, and a cheap wrap -> spicy chicken fajitas. Cheap pork, a $2 box of rice pilaf, some fresh vegis, and a crock pot, and I've got 3-4 meals for all of $7-8, done in the time it takes me to drink a few beers while doing homework.
 
I really think poverty around here is tied to a lack of education. If I didn't know how to cook delicious stuff, on the cheap, I'd go eat fast food all the time. And by doing so, I'd be poorer. I think this ties nicely into smoking as well. I'm educated enough to understand that spending $5 a day on cigs is the same as paying $150 a month, $1825 a year for cancer. I'd rather save that $5 for a few days, and spend it going out with friends. That's a luxury that addicts don't have.
 
I idly wonder what would happen if you educated poor people on the basics of cooking. I've made some pretty good dinners with nothing but a cast-iron pot and a campfire. Cheap, easy, tasty meals are entirely possible. How much does education play into that?

Re:taxes

[ceoyoyo]

Yes, perhaps it's a cycle - someone's parents don't teach them how to cook and it just cascades down the generations.

I knew a guy who figured out that if he invited everyone over for a pot luck dinner on the weekend he'd have more than enough leftovers for lunches and suppers for the whole week. He basically got to eat (and drink, but he and his roommate made their own wine), for about $10-$15 a week. The rest of us didn't do quite as well but we got a good meal and socializing on the weekend plus as much $2 a bottle wine as we wanted (it was pretty good, even - his roommate was a chemical engineer).

And yet they do nothing to discourage the car

[antifoidulus]

dependence culture in the US. I've lived in both East Asia and Europe for the past 6 years of my life and every time I come back home I am just shocked at the utter disdain towards people who don't drive. In much of Europe(and a lesser extent in Japan), cyclists are treated with respect when they are on the road and there are a lot of facilities set up for cyclists to commute, futhermore in residential areas there are plenty of pedestrian areas. As a result kids(and adults) can work exercise into their daily routine safely and easily. Now compare that with most of the United States, where if there are any pedestrian signals at all, they last for a very short period of time(I was in Phoenix and I swear the walk signal only lasted for 15 seconds when crossing a 6 lane road), there are few special paths for pedestrians, and anyone that doesn't drive a car is treated as if they are worthless as a human being. I've heard tons of stories from cyclists in the US detailing how people in vehicles purposely drive as close as possible to them, cut them off, throw things at them etc.

As a result most Americans never walk anywhere simply because it isn't safe to do so. We only walk from our front door to the car and from the parking lot to the office. Its no wonder why Americans are the fattest people in the world. We need a radical cultural shift away from this whole notion that people who don't drive are worthless human beings and away from this dependence on cars

Re:Diet sodas

[pla]

Diet sodas make your body expect energy.

Why?

I could accept the same argument for just about anything else, but a liquid?

Evolutionarily, our bodies "expect" exactly one substance to enter our bodies when we drink - Water. And water has no calories.

That does segue into one of my own objections to the topic, however...


"there are concerns that diet beverages may increase calorie consumption by justifying consumption of other caloric foods"...

Well, yeah! I started drinking diet soda (despite a preference for real sugared sodas) primarily because I don't prefer the sugared version enough to give up literally one meal a day to offset the calories. What next, will they regulate going to the gym because of "concerns" that people might actually exercise solely so they can have an extra serving of dessert after dinner?

I don't eat more as a result of diet sodas... I just don't have to eat less.

Re:makes sense

[doshell]

I find it funny that, being the United States the land of the free and all, most Americans just can't warp their heads around the fact that they've been brainwashed for the past 70 years into thinking that anything even remotely resembling socialism is evil. This is especially obvious considering the fact that a lot of Americans regard Obama as a dangerous socialist. Those who actually know what socialism is cannot help but laugh at such an idea.

But I digress. We've had what you call "universal health care" in Europe (and I don't mean the left bloc countries; I mean western and northern Europe as well) for decades, and in general it has worked acceptably, thank you very much. I've never seen the governments of any of those countries pushing to regulate what people eat and drink, how much exercise they make, when they go to sleep, or when they die. I don't know where you get the idea that universal health care implies that, but keep in mind that saying so does not make it true.

Sadly, the real question behind the universal health care debate really is the one most often forgotten, because you're too busy discussing how much control the government will have over you, and how much money the rich will have to fork over for universal health care to work. The real question is what should we do about people who absolutely cannot pay for health care or health insurance, because they are unemployed and have no savings; because they were marginalized and no one will give them a job; because they have become permanently disabled and cannot work. Should we let them live a miserable life and even die in the name of small government and the right to be rich? Until the "no universal health care" camp gives an acceptable answer to that question, their arguments are all moot to me.

Re:makes sense

[evilviper]

Among the major options that many right-leaning politicians in America have been pushing is tearing down regulation that has prevented insurance companies from offering low-cost catastrophic-only insurance, and removing regulation that prevents cross-state offerings for insurance. Those two items alone would greatly expand the choices and lower prices across the board for insurance.

Look up recision. In the private health insurance market (ie. not through your employer) if you start racking up significant medical bills, you have a ~50% chance that your insurance company will find some excuse to cancel your insurance coverage on any technicality they can come up with.

THAT is what an unregulated health insurance industry will get you. It's cheaper to only insure people who won't get sick, so everyone will find some way to eliminate those with any chance of major bills, or worse, discontinue their insurance for no reason when they actually start to need it.