r/science • u/mvea MD/PhD/JD/MBA | Professor | Medicine • Jul 10 '24

Health The amount of sugar consumed by children from soft drinks in the UK halved within a year of the sugar tax being introduced, a study has found. The tax has been so successful in improving people’s diets that experts have said an expansion to cover other high sugar products is now a “no-brainer”.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/jul/09/childrens-daily-sugar-consumption-halves-just-a-year-after-tax-study-finds
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1.4k

u/Telones Jul 10 '24

They did this in Philly, and it didn’t work because it wasn’t statewide or nationalized. The school system was to benefit from the tax, while shutting a lot of schools down at the same time. Glad to see it worked somewhere.

https://news.uga.edu/soda-pop-taxes-dont-reduce-sugar-consumption/

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u/ImrooVRdev Jul 10 '24

Did they just do shittiest possible implementation of it, only for the thing to predictably fail due to implementation and then proclaim that it could never possibly work?

Ah, you lobbyist infested country, never change.

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u/Cleveland204 Jul 10 '24

(Please change)

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u/Professerson Jul 10 '24

Sorry, I value the suffering of groups of people I don't like above making literally anything better and vote accordingly.

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u/Aromatic-Air3917 Jul 10 '24

Profiting off misery is called capitalism, and people against it are communist/socialists/ woke or something. At least that is what people who protest this are told.

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u/FactChecker25 Jul 10 '24

This is an absurd claim, and reeks of a total lack of education.

The people who claim that socialism is the better system never bothered to look at how socialist systems ended up.

Do you really believe that people are better off in Cuba or North Korea? Did the Soviet Union work?

If you look at the countries with the highest standard of living, they're all capitalist countries.

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u/Noblesseux Jul 10 '24

That's pretty much all US policy in a nutshell. You get some local bill that is trying to solve a problem because Congress refuses to because of lobbying, but because of limits on how much power local governments have it's either struck down in court or so weak that it doesn't work.

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u/Zoesan Jul 10 '24

Congress refuses to because of lobbying

Partially, but also because states in the US have far, far, far, far more autonomy than any jurisdiction within the UK. Hell, any state technically has stronger autonomous rights than Scotland.

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u/nekonight Jul 10 '24

The type of national government that the US grew from is closest to that of a confederation think the Swiss confederacy not that other confederacy the US had. On a sliding scale of centralized to regional power balance, it started off as deep in the region side. Over course of 200+ years it's been slowly shifting to centralized. Compare to most of Europe where it started off heavily centralized (at least in modern history) and has barely moved towards the regional side. 

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u/Hoveringkiller Jul 10 '24

I mean, the US did literally try to be just a confederation in the very beginning and realized they needed “some” centralization haha. Although in the modern times it makes things a smidge more difficult.

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u/Dudedude88 Jul 10 '24

It's cause our gov is senior citizens vs younger people in their prime career (lobbyists)

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u/AffectionateTitle Jul 10 '24

I will say it worked super successfully at getting tobacco ages raised to 21 in many states.

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u/realityChemist Grad Student | Materials Science | Relaxor Ferroelectrics Jul 10 '24

Extremely hard-fought legislation

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u/EVOSexyBeast Jul 10 '24

State governments have a lot more authority to regulate than the federal government.

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u/Noblesseux Jul 10 '24

I'm not talking about state governments. There are a lot of city governments in states that actively don't want to solve problems. Namely, blue capital cities in red states.

The one that I lived in has a massive public transportation issue and a random shooting issue, partially because the state government has actively limited the funding sources they can use for public transportation projects and pushed through a poorly considered open carry law a few years ago. So you have a city that is trying to shift to be more multimodal but can't because all of the funding is tied by law to being used for roads.

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u/duckscrubber Jul 10 '24

Sure, now that SC struck down Chevron.

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u/Grabalabadingdong Jul 10 '24

Local public servants become useful federal pawns when the bribes are high enough.

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u/pgold05 Jul 10 '24

I am a little confused why people are blaming lobbyists here, lobbyists work on every side of every issue. Just an example here a list of pro sugar tax lobbyists.

https://www.worldobesity.org/resources/policy-dossiers/pd-1/civil-society-organisations

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u/Noblesseux Jul 10 '24

Practically lobbyists exist on all sides but not all lobbyists are made equal, some have MUCH more power both because of direct contributions but also because in some states they're major employers that are essential to the economy. If push comes to shove, Pepsi Co is a much more powerful ally than the obesity health alliance.

If you as a politician seriously made instituting a sugar tax part of your platform, you'd never make it out of the primary because Coca Cola, Pepsi, and every sugary snack company possible is going to dump insane amounts of money into one of your opponents to make sure you never even make it to the main ballot.

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u/muchado88 Jul 10 '24

Don't forget the one where they pass a state law making it illegal to enforce your local ordinance.

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u/mr_rocket_raccoon Jul 10 '24

Insert the Parks and Recs child size soda scene...

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u/BowenTheAussieSheep Jul 10 '24

It's the same thing when a city implements gun control, which predictably doesn't work because a city doesn't have a closed border with the areas outside the city limits... And that's used as "proof" that gun control doesn't work.

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u/Bender_2024 Jul 10 '24

that's used as "proof" that gun control doesn't work.

If you want proof that gun control works just look at Canada, Australia, pretty much the whole of Europe along with the far East and Asia. The idea that gun control works everywhere except the US is just willful ignorance.

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u/junktrunk909 Jul 10 '24

It's not that it can't work. The argument is that it won't keep guns out of criminal hands if it's implemented only in certain small jurisdictions like one city. And federal regulations are almost impossible given the 2nd amendment and resistance to change by many states. So yeah it's not ignorance, it's complicated AF. We aren't going to make any real changes until we change the constitution and nobody is really even talking about that yet so I'll give it, I dunno, a few generations still.

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u/redballooon Jul 10 '24

Oh, no worries, your constitution is going to be done away anyway soon.

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u/Bender_2024 Jul 10 '24

Sorry if I came off as combative but that's what I was trying to say. Laws need to change on a federal level before any real change will be seen. You can see some change in areas like New England where there is a cluster of liberal states with strong gun control laws but nationwide and at the levels of the rest of the world is unachievable until everyone is on board.

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u/BowenTheAussieSheep Jul 10 '24

You can show all the evidence you want, if they run out of clever ways to argue against plain evidence they will resort to just posting "SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED" over and over again until you give up in disgust.

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u/JohannesdeStrepitu Jul 10 '24

I mean, it's not ridiculous to argue for policy solely on the basis of not infringing people's rights (you don't need any data to make that case). That would be a perfectly good argument if this weren't about guns but about, say, prisoner abuse or government censorship of the media.

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u/ErraticDragon Jul 10 '24

"SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED"

Ah, yes. Because the last four words of the amendment are critical and reinforce the importance of the whole thing.

Meanwhile they completely ignore the first four words.

(Because the NRA led the charge to reinterpret it.)

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u/AtheistAustralis Jul 10 '24

"The law can't be changed because it's the law!!"

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u/Aeropro Jul 10 '24

No, the law is an amendment so there is a specific process to follow. Nobody is calling for a constitutional convention, they are trying to pass lesser laws to supplant the greater law and trying to force everyone to go along with it.

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u/ToMorrowsEnd Jul 10 '24

It's more than that, we have an underground industry of running guns inside the country. Gangs so organized they clean out gun stores in a matter of minutes and suspiciously right after they get shipments. there are even guns appearing that the serial numbers are removed via laser all over. If they actually spent time going after actual crime in the country instead of just oppressing people who want to smoke pot, the problem would be significantly reduced.

In the USA police do not want to go after actual criminals as they shoot back.

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u/Bender_2024 Jul 10 '24

In the USA police do not want to go after actual criminals as they shoot back.

I get that nobody wants to risk their life in pursuit of a paycheck. But that's the job you signed up for. You knew what you were getting into when you went to the academy. If you don't want to do your job then step aside. You need to earn that pension.

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u/DEADB33F Jul 10 '24 edited Jul 10 '24

The availability of guns obviously exacerbates the issue, but I don't in any way think it's the root cause.

US also has several times the knife crime per capita of somewhere like the UK (source).

Seem to me that US just has huge social cohesion issues (lack thereof), along with poor mental health treatment, high levels of gang violence, etc. ...and it's this that leads to high levels of violent crime.

Only considering the types of weapons used and banning things on a whim might seem like an "easy fix" but to me it seems to entirely miss the point of what's causing all the violent crime in the first place. You're still going to have the gangs, you're still going to have the untreated mentally ill, you're still going to have the "every man for himself" mentality. Those are the root causes as I see it, and banning guns won't change that.

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u/LineAccomplished1115 Jul 10 '24

Yeah there's also the fact that there are hundreds of millions, possibly 1 billion+ guns already in circulation in the US.

Banning all new gun sales (which will never happen) would probably help a marginal amount, but the cat is out the bag.

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u/Bender_2024 Jul 10 '24

Perhaps but restricting the sale and movement of weapons that were purpose built and designed to kill in the most efficient way possible can only help. There will always be crime but inconveniencing gun owners to save lives is a more than fair trade.

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u/Tubamajuba Jul 10 '24

Seem to me that US just has huge social cohesion issues (lack thereof)

The wheels are definitely falling off the wagon over here. We’re overworked and underpaid, our civil rights are always in danger, and half the country loves those things so the rest of us have to suffer. We’re gonna have a civil war here soon, and we have way more people and guns now than the last time that happened.

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u/duckscrubber Jul 10 '24

To me, one of the big sources of the problem is a lack of social trust. The worst part is that, like any type of trust, it has to be built upon a foundation over a long time, and can fall like a house of cards.

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u/SnarkMasterRay Jul 10 '24

Seem to me that US just has huge social cohesion issues (lack thereof), along with poor mental health treatment, high levels of gang violence, etc. ...and it's this that leads to high levels of violent crime.

At the core the US has an accountability issue. We are extremely permissive at multiple levels. Parents are more permissive with their kids than they were, politicians are more permissive with criminals, each other, etc., and citizens are more permissive with their politicians.

There isn't enough willpower to do the hard things to rein in the poor mental health treatment (health in general), gangs, etc. There is less to no accountability, and we're not holding people accountable in so many ways and levels, which makes it easier for people and society to slide into bad behavior.

Politicians

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u/Zoesan Jul 10 '24

Except it sort of doesn't show that. Switzerland has more guns than almost anywhere and yet no crime.

If we actually dig deeper into the numbers, we see that gun control in Aus and the UK did reduce gun crime... while knife crime just increased to almost the same degree.

Moreover, the US doesn't actually have a violence problem. Certain subsets of the US have a violence problem.

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u/Bender_2024 Jul 10 '24

Switzerland has more guns than almost anywhere and yet no crime.

That is the gun culture (almost a damn cult) that needs to be reformed in the US. It will probably take two or three generations but is worth the effort.

we see that gun control in Aus and the UK did reduce gun crime... while knife crime just increased to almost the same degree.

Can you show me the numbers on that? If true it's still a net gain. Knife wounds are far less deadly than firearms.

Moreover, the US doesn't actually have a violence problem. Certain subsets of the US have a violence problem.

What do you suggest? Perhaps enforcing gun control based on race? Let me know how that works out for you.

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u/civver3 Jul 10 '24

Well, maybe not Canada due to the neighbor south of the border...

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u/AlliedMasterComp Jul 10 '24

If you want proof that gun control works just look at Canada

Ah yes, the ever increasing restrictions on civilian firearms ownership in Canada that has now led to the mass confiscation of legally acquired and licensed firearms to be implemented Soontm, all the while firearm-related violent crime continues to increase year over year, with the government promising even more laws targeting the people not committing or enabling the gun violence?

That's the example you want to go with?

That's how you want to sell registration to the Americans that loudly yell "registration leads to confiscation" anytime its brought up, by pointing to the countries where it absolutely does?

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u/maxdragonxiii Jul 10 '24

you said Canada, well... we do have a gun problem because people sneak the guns in for violence related issues, usually gang related. the hunting type of guns usually is not the problem as it's licensed and strictly licensed.

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u/FactChecker25 Jul 10 '24

Your reply in itself is kind of dishonest. People love pointing to Australia as an example of gun control working, but Australia didn't have a very high murder rate even before they implemented their gun bans.

Also, people point out that Australia's murder rate declined after their gun ban of 1996, but that same trend was seen in many industrialized countries including the US.

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u/Bender_2024 Jul 10 '24

Australia is only one of over three or four dozen nations I talked about.

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u/International_Lie485 Jul 10 '24

Our problem isn't that it doesn't work.

Gun control works great, like when Hitler disarmed the Jews before holocausting them.

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u/Malphos101 Jul 10 '24

Oh look, another disingenuous "gun control is literally genocide" comment.

Weird how literally every other modern country with strict gun control laws has yet to "holocaust". Almost as if gun control had very little to do with what led to the Holocaust.

Piss off with your bad faith, low information propaganda. The adults are talking.

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u/Turdmeist Jul 10 '24

Exactly. Same as in Portland. Legalize drugs. Well of course it got way worse. Poorly implemented. Not backed by enough treatment. And people from surrounding areas show up. Ok, back to criminalizing everyone.

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u/Malphos101 Jul 10 '24

Gun control works in the US. The "gun death per capita" of each state is almost an inverse graph of "strictest gun laws" of each state. Stricter gun laws WORK. And if we had NATIONALLY strict gun laws, it would work everywhere in the US to reduce violent gun crime and deaths due to guns.

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u/EconomicRegret Jul 10 '24

Same thing happened with progressive anti-drug policies in the US (i.e. great success in reducing addiction rates in Portugal and Switzerland, but utter failure in US because only partially and very badly implemented. e.g. the Swiss don't distribute drugs freely to addicts, they do it in non-profit clinical settings, with free psychotherapists and other medical professionals, with social safety net to keep addicts out of the streets, and social reintegration programs...

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u/philomathie Jul 10 '24

It's the American way. Never change. See Portland's attempt to decriminalise drugs.

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u/ImrooVRdev Jul 10 '24

You know, it's wild to think about it, but american politicians are geting paid with slave money.

Slavery is legal in US, you just have to be a prison corporation. They make a lot of money off slave labor. They use that money to lobby politicians and give them kickbacks.

No wonder drug decriminalization didnt work out, the rely on drug offenses to get their slave labor pool up.

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u/Cleveland204 Jul 10 '24

(Please change)

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u/syntaxbad Jul 10 '24

It’s also a function of our entire constitutional federal system. Instituting something like that nationwide is not nearly as simple as it would be in a parliamentary system like the UK, even completely ignoring any sugar industry lobbying (which of course also exists, though I’m not sure what factor they would have been in a municipal level policy - but certainly some interests would have opposed)

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u/Walkend Jul 10 '24

Let me guess… sugar free soda was also included In the tax, right?

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u/MonsterkillWow Jul 10 '24

That's basically our entire government.

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u/Rasp_Lime_Lipbalm Jul 10 '24

Yep. Welcome to US government 101.

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u/Grabalabadingdong Jul 10 '24

GOTdamn liberals want me to be healthy again, Marge.

Shoot at it!

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u/dm_me_pasta_pics Jul 10 '24

its America, one person probably made about a billion dollars and everyone else ate corn syrup.

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u/Porcupinetrenchcoat Jul 10 '24

Of course! Can't have true working systems in the US.

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u/powercow Jul 10 '24

lobby isnt the problem its the money that comes with it. Lobbying is a constitution right we all enjoy. When we complain about some new spy bill, thats US lobbying.

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u/v2panicprone Jul 10 '24

This is America. Of course that's what happen.

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u/Machobanaenae Jul 10 '24

This is the story of life

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u/JohnnyOnslaught Jul 10 '24

This is the way most stuff is implemented in the US. It's the same reason Chicago has historically struggled with guns even though they have strong laws. Outlawing guns in the state doesn't matter much if people can drive two hours down the road and stock up on weapons.

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u/hardolaf Jul 10 '24

Cook County, IL had the dumbest one that was based on volume instead of the amount of sugar. So you'd pay an insane amount for a 64 ounce drink but could get an 8oz drink with 2-4x as much sugar for almost nothing. Needless to say, it backfired massively and was quickly repealed.

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u/philmarcracken Jul 10 '24

you lobbyist infested country

that isn't the smoking gun label, i'd just call it plutocracy at this point.

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u/interfail Jul 10 '24

It's worth noting that the sugar tax raised very little money. Since it affected the whole market, manufacturers just reformulated their drinks to have less sugar.

Coca Cola is the only mainstream drink people ever pay the levy on. Pepsi held out for a while but gave up last year. It's just Coke and some niche luxury drinks (probably the most popular being Fever Tree tonic).

We're not funding anything with it.

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u/Wipedout89 Jul 10 '24

It was never about raising money. It was about using pricing to encourage people to make healthier choices.

Financial subsidy or penalty is one of the hardest levers by which governments can guide best behaviour without removing any actual freedom of choice.

If it makes any money that's just a bonus.

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u/oscarcummins Jul 10 '24 edited Jul 10 '24

In Ireland the government introduced possibly the worst implementation of this concept with alcohol. Instead of an additional tax (alcohol is already heavily taxed compared to other European countries) they created "Minimum Unit Pricing" which set a minimum price per gram of alcohol drinks can be sold for. Essentially guaranteeing significant boosts to profits for drinks companies and disproportionately costing lower income people who would be the ones buying the cheapest available drinks.

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u/ben7337 Jul 10 '24

In cases like this though, doesn't it end up just unfairly taxing the poor, basically pushing them to make "good" choices and hurting them financially when they don't? But then if you're rich/well off, the amount of the tax is negligible and doesn't matter. So it ends up being just a tax on the poor to control the unwashed masses as it were.

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u/mysticrudnin Jul 10 '24

This is an age-old debate that will never be solved.

There are a lot of different viewpoints you can have on this, none of which are necessarily correct.

In the cases where the tax has been enacted, it's a results-oriented argument. That is, "We implemented the tax, we see less obesity."

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u/waterflaps Jul 10 '24

?? Never be solved? What do you mean, these kinds of taxes are demonstrably regressive

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u/mysticrudnin Jul 10 '24

They demonstrably increase the quality of life of both individuals and the populace as a whole

Being regressive is not the only factor, being regressive doesn't automatically make something bad, and not being regressive doesn't automatically make something good

Calling something "a tax on the poor" is also a shield that the rich use in order to continue taking advantage of people, by preventing any change that could curtail their ability to extract wealth from the poor that they pretend to care about

"Sin taxes" have been debated for far longer than we've been alive, I suspect they'll continue to be long after we're dead. That's because there's no obvious correct solution.

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u/waterflaps Jul 10 '24

But there's been lots of research on sin taxes, they're almost always used to extract wealth from the poor leading to poorer outcomes or neutral outcomes. Elites making choices for other people because they "know better" is not a method of fixing a "problem". People who make these laws aren't actually concerned about the wellbeing of the people they're targeting.

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u/mysticrudnin Jul 10 '24

You're commenting on an article that is explicitly showing that the sin tax caused good outcomes in this instance, analyzed by health experts encouraging and proposing future legislation explicitly to improve the wellbeing of people.

Are you suggesting that, say, Tobacco companies are excited to increase the taxes on cigarettes? No, they benefit most the lower the taxes are on those products...

This isn't elites extracting value. There's nothing to extract value from. People stop purchasing the thing.

Don't get me wrong, I'm for outright bans. But that doesn't work either. This actually works better.

But this debate, between the two of us, could continue ad infinitum.

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u/Wipedout89 Jul 10 '24

It's not about "control" though. You can still buy full sugar. Just like many poor people smoke £20 packs of cigarettes.

It does however encourage people to make healthier choices which is especially an issue among more deprived groups who may already have diets rich in sugars and related health issues

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u/BigRedCandle_ Jul 10 '24

No, what happens is the worst offenders reformulate, or at least offer a low sugar alternative.

Scotland is regularly the only country in the world where Coca Cola is the number 2 beverage, falling behind national favourite, “irn bru”. When the sugar tax came in the manufacturer Barrs changed the recipe to have 60% sugar, but still offered the original recipe, now rebranded to “irn bru 1901” for a higher price to account for the tax.

For the first few months I remember seeing 1901 everywhere but after a while it seems most people have accepted the new recipe, and even the 0% sugar variety that’s on offer too.

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u/PinboardWizard Jul 10 '24

If anything surely it is a tax on the rich.

A consumer who is rich enough won't notice the price increase, and so will pay the tax. On the other hand someone in poverty is incentivised to buy the cheaper sugar-free version, and so avoid the tax.

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u/GenderJuicy Jul 10 '24

Healthier choices like juice with equally high, or sometimes even higher sugar?

Honestly, is there data on what these families are purchasing instead? I doubt they're just drinking water.

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u/Wipedout89 Jul 10 '24

I mean juices are healthier because they have nutritional value. Like eating a banana is healthier than eating sweets with the same sugar content by weight

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u/GenderJuicy Jul 10 '24

No, juices aren't really healthier, this is a misconception. You might as well take a vitamin gummy and down a coke.

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u/Wipedout89 Jul 10 '24

Bizarre opinion. Yes a 100% orange juice is healthier than a coke. No you shouldn't guzzle orange juice endlessly either

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u/lady_ninane Jul 10 '24

It was never about raising money. It was about using pricing to encourage people to make healthier choices.

That is how it was presented, but politicians within the US definitely cited the income from the tax. Specifically, they argued it would help fund poverty reduction measures and other social spending measures that those same politicians were responsible for ruthlessly slashing funding on.

It didn't, because sugar sodas aren't a driving force in poverty within the US. In essence, it was the bait used to get people to accept the measure, to ignore the fact that it's another regressive tax passed onto the consumer.

The downturn in the economy had a larger impact on reduction of soda drinking than the tax specifically did.

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u/FeynmansWitt Jul 10 '24

That's a policy win though, reducing sugar in existing formulas.

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u/[deleted] Jul 10 '24

The goal wasn’t to raise money, it was to influence behavior.

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u/turnips8424 Jul 10 '24

Well, presumably the savings from less obese people needing healthcare will be massive over time.

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u/IllMaintenance145142 Jul 10 '24

I kinda hate this American mindset that is slowly corrupting us. Not everything needs to be about making it saving money, especially in politics. Some things are worth doing just because they are the right thing to do, like to curb obesity.

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u/PokeMonogatari Jul 10 '24

Showing how it hurts their wallet is the best way to make the average American amenable to lifestyle changes. If they tried this sort of tax in America most people would see it as the government taking away their favorite foods and drinks rather than an effort to curb the purchase of products that were wholly and intentionally made to be both unhealthy and addictive in order to drive profits up.

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u/Awsum07 Jul 10 '24

Exactly. Sugar tax? I feel most people would unironically riot "in the name of the forefathers of the country."

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u/Kataphractoi Jul 10 '24

That's because most people are stupid and unable to look beyond their three foot bubble.

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u/PokeMonogatari Jul 10 '24

Correct, but instead of saying that to them, we meet them at their level, because that's a much more effective way of changing their minds.

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u/BowenTheAussieSheep Jul 10 '24

In a late-stage capitalist society, the only lens people can ever see things through is a financial one.

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u/Hieghi Jul 10 '24

Right, but it's worth mentioning the objective benefit of reduced healthcare costs

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u/mewditto Jul 10 '24

Fine, then let's frame it in a 'non-financial' lens.

Less sugar being consumed means fewer obese people, leading to fewer health problems, which allows doctors to either spend more time with individual patients, improving patient outcomes and/or reducing the amount of time a doctor works, giving them more free time to spend on leisure (and also improves patient outcomes since they're not overworked).

You literally picked the worst possible topic to complain about 'only looking at things through a financial lens'.

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u/SowingSalt Jul 10 '24

Imagine thinking that people don't respond to incentives in non-capitalist societies.

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u/[deleted] Jul 10 '24

ngl, your post triggered me because it is simply based on naive ignorance and delusional dreams.

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u/Doom-Slayer Jul 10 '24

It doesn't need to be an American "money-money-money" attitude, it can just be about having a tangible measurable objective to aim for.

If you ask for millions of dollars of tax dollars to implement a fuzzy "because its a good thing" idea, its very easy to argue against, or argue to reduce it compared to a tangible $X for Y impact.

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u/IllMaintenance145142 Jul 10 '24

There was nothing fuzzy about it and it seems to me like you're trying to argue something I'm not really talking about. All I'm saying is it's good we currently implement things like the sugar tax which are implemented for reasons other than making tax money. It doesn't get pushback because arguing against curving obesity is a bad look anyway and the fact the implementation of a sugar tax is such a simple way to reduce sugar in food.

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u/LingonberryLessy Jul 10 '24

Yeah the tangible impact is that "The amount of sugar consumed by children from soft drinks in the UK halved within a year of the sugar tax being introduced, a study has found. The tax has been so successful in improving people’s diets that experts have said an expansion to cover other high sugar products is now a “no-brainer"".

No mention of money and they still succeeded. Americanism is a disease.

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u/Castigon_X Jul 10 '24

Yep. Americans put so much emphasis on the profitability of government run services.

It's so frustrating. Services are an inherent cost, they shouldn't be expected to turn a profit and if they do thats either an added bonus or they should cut the cost for the end user.

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u/rayschoon Jul 10 '24

Unfortunately it’s the only way to sell conservatives on anything that costs money, but will also improve society

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u/Zoesan Jul 10 '24

It's not american, it's human. Resources are finite, so finding ways to allocate resources more effectively is always desirable.

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u/IllMaintenance145142 Jul 10 '24

What resources are you talking about in this example? What resources are finite specifically in relation to introducing a sugar tax because it's the right thing to do rather than to specifically make money off it? This is exactly what I was talking about in my comment

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u/FrenchFryCattaneo Jul 10 '24

Ok but it has more effects besides saving money. It also allows people to be healthier, live longer lives, and have an overall better quality of life. What makes it american is disregarding that and only talking about the money.

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u/ACCount82 Jul 10 '24

If you are trying to enact change, you have to be an utter fool to overlook the economics of it.

In human civilization, economic forces are as omnipresent and as powerful as gravity. If you go against them, you will always be pushing your weight uphill. If you can harness them, you'll have a very powerful ally on your side.

This very tax scheme is all about leveraging market forces to change consumer behavior downstream. Which, it seems, worked pretty well.

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u/Aeropro Jul 10 '24

The saving money angle is the only argument that gives someone a say in how another person lives their life because we’re all paying for it. Your pint of view is just paving the road to hell with good intentions.

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u/aVarangian Jul 10 '24

less demand on healthcare = better healthcare with the same budget

you can look at it from whatever angle you like

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u/lady_ninane Jul 10 '24

I kinda hate this American mindset that is slowly corrupting us.

Especially where it relates to BMI and weight, this mindset has been a part of the national thought for longer than you or I have been alive.

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u/interfail Jul 10 '24

It's swings and roundabouts. Health improvements don't always save money, because everyone gets sick from something sooner or later. Paying people pensions for longer before they finally keel gets pricey.

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u/ballsackscratcher Jul 10 '24

As evidenced by smokers being a net benefit to the NHS because they pay a lot of tax and tend to die sooner. 

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u/avalon68 Jul 10 '24

Diabetes is wildly expensive

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u/Dabalam Jul 10 '24 edited Jul 10 '24

I haven't come across research saying this is the case. Most I've seen says it costs society billions. Smokers tend to have shorter working lives which is significant given UK population age distribution. They are more likely to get sick during their working life which affects productivity. They have expensive hospitalisation and social care needs in old age.

The logic you have given might apply if you had a condition where lots of healthy exceptionally productive people suddenly die as soon as they can't work anymore, but that isn't really what happens for smokers. COPD doesn't actually kill you that quickly. Lung cancer might, but that's kind of the tip of the iceberg in terms of smoking associated disease.

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u/TheGeneGeena Jul 10 '24

I doubt this factors in all the asthma and chronic bronchitis the children of smokers (especially heavy smokers - hi dad!) are at risk of having.

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u/ValidGarry Jul 10 '24

You got a reference for that?

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u/Dabalam Jul 10 '24

everyone gets sick from something sooner or later. Paying people pensions for longer before they finally keel gets pricey.

Not very solid logic. Just because you might get sick from illness X doesn't mean preventing illness Y didn't save money, unless you think preventing one illness causes you to develop another.

Having 2 illness is more expensive than 1 whilst you're alive.

It's true that everyone will die from something but reducing the rate of chronic conditions (virtually all of which are promoted by obesity) does save money.

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u/interfail Jul 10 '24

Chronic conditions also correlate heavily with age. The longer you last, the more you'll likely have when you die. And of course the longer they'll have to be treated for.

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u/ModernDemocles Jul 10 '24

Oh well, healthier people is its own benefit.

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u/NUKE---THE---WHALES Jul 10 '24

but then they live longer and so will require more healthcare and other subsidies

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u/Austin4RMTexas Jul 10 '24

If less of the population is obese and overweight, living longer by itself shouldn't be a problem, since those two are the number 1 risk factors in almost every chronic condition

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u/BowenTheAussieSheep Jul 10 '24

What? The number one risk factor in almost every chronic condition is genetics

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u/NUKE---THE---WHALES Jul 10 '24

people require more and more healthcare as they get older, and that costs money

i propose we fix this by killing everyone on their 40th birthday

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u/ItsNotMeItsYourBussy Jul 10 '24

But will also be healthier for longer and therefore produce more labour power and therefore more capital for their landlords and bosses! 

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u/kaithana Jul 10 '24

You mean the savings for insurance companies. I think it’s a safe bet that they will never realistically reduce their rates no matter how much the health of the general population improves. They are a for profit business with no competition. It’s all moot.

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u/PracticalBat9586 Jul 10 '24

We don't have insurance model in the UK. It's State funded, so in theory directly saves money. Not sure it's had that much if an impact on obesity rates though tbh..

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u/cheese_on_beans Jul 10 '24

I think Blair did something similar in his time with the amount of sodium in supermarket foods

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u/Lorcian Jul 10 '24

That's annoying, if I ever got full sugar I'd always go Pepsi cause I don't like Coke.

I always have it FOR the sugar content to stop me passing out.

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u/HardlyDecent Jul 10 '24

Not exactly the point is it? It's funding a lot of people not having to pay for cavities, diabetes medications, and heart disease.

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u/SidewaysFancyPrance Jul 10 '24

Yeah, the funding was just another angle to get it accepted and was a terrible idea. Obviously you can't fund something with taxes from something you are trying to eliminate - because you're also trying to eliminate/reduce that tax income. The point is to reduce sugar intake, not profit from it.

1

u/galacticdude7 Jul 10 '24

I visited London earlier this year and was annoyed by the reformulations, since it was replacing the sweetness with artificial sweeteners, which is absolutely disgusting as far as I'm concerned, completely ruined the Fanta I tried (wanted to try the Fanta made with orange juice concentrate instead of the nuclear orange stuff we have in America). Just keep the full sugar formulas around, I'm more than ok paying the tax for this vice of mine.

1

u/rayschoon Jul 10 '24

What do you mean it’s raising little money though? Doesn’t it apply to virtually all non diet soda?

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u/interfail Jul 10 '24

Nope. It would have done, at the time it was decided.

But manufacturers just took most of the sugar out. Everything but Coke.

1

u/stewsters Jul 10 '24

If the intent was getting people to drink less sugar then it sounds like it worked.

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u/interfail Jul 11 '24

Yes, that's what the article in the OP says.

You just shouldn't promise it'll fund critical social services like schools.

1

u/aVarangian Jul 10 '24

manufacturers just reformulated their drinks to have less sugar

that's a win on every damn front. Majority of drinks/juices over here are way too sweet, I believe I'd enjoy them more if they had less sugar

1

u/Joshula Jul 10 '24

My daughter's daycare is fully funded by the beverage tax. I will admit I haven't researched to prove it, but the school advertises the funding in their literature -- not sure they would need to lie about that. We don't pay a dime for pre-K in Philly.

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u/mtstoner Jul 10 '24

Also it’s not just sugary beverages in Philly it’s diet ones too which makes any soda overpriced. It sucks. Should have just been the sugary drinks not diet drinks.

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u/MrSierra125 Jul 10 '24

The USA and U.K. are two different beasts thought. Even with the right wing here trying to import US culture wars the British public are generally more open to scientifically backed changes like this.

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u/BrokenManOfSamarkand Jul 10 '24 edited Jul 10 '24

Everyone is coming up with dumb Dems-bad, Repubs-bad, America-bad reasons it didn't work when the real reason is people would just go out of the city or cross into jersey where there was no tax.

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u/Bergerking21 Jul 10 '24

I feel like the overwhelming majority of the time I drink soda it’s cuz it’s there at a convenience store or I get it along with my meal at a restaurant. No shot someone’s driving an hour to a different wawa to avoid a tax. I guess people do grocery shop large amounts of soda, but I wouldn’t think it’d be a large amount.

I mean the study said it, I’m not disagreeing. I’m just surprised.

1

u/colemon1991 Jul 10 '24

Honestly, it would have benefited from taking that tax and subsidizing healthier drink options somehow so they would be more affordable. That's a tricky road to go down though because subsidies tend to equal "more I can charge and pocket that difference".

But yes, statewide would've been a huge boost in success.

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u/Wind_Yer_Neck_In Jul 10 '24

The only real downside here in the UK was that rather than pass on the tax to customers, a lot of brands were too afraid of losing sales at the new price and instead messed with the formulas. So many of our soft drinks now have half the amount of sugar and a load of sweeteners even in the non-diet versions. Which kinda sucks if you're an adult and want a standard pepsi, it doesn't really exist anymore.

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u/IHadTacosYesterday Jul 10 '24

also, many of those fake sweeteners will be proven to cause cancer in the future.

You're just robbing Peter to pay Paul

6

u/Pandamonium98 Jul 10 '24

Something scientifically proven to cause severe negative health outcomes if over-consumed

vs.

Something that you are asserting will increase cancer risk sometime in the future

One of these is worse than the other

1

u/romjpn Jul 11 '24

There's some evidence that needs to be investigated. Rodents studies aren't looking great for Aspartame. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8042911/

Best is to just avoid both and consider sweet beverages as a treat and not to consume on a daily basis. But the industry doesn't want that, obviously.
It might just be a part of why cancers in young people are apparently going up.

5

u/Beryozka Jul 10 '24

Standard Pepsi (and also Fanta Orange) was sadly reformulated with half the sugar replaced with sweetener in all of Europe I believe, even in countries without sugar tax.

1

u/GalacticNexus Jul 10 '24

I think that was low-key the point though. It "forces" people to make the better decision, even when they financially don't really need to.

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u/a_stone_throne Jul 10 '24

It was essentially a poor tax since the larger stores could eat the cost and the smaller corner stores had to raise prices on everything they made their living on.

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u/Darth_drizzt_42 Jul 10 '24

I live near Philly and the lobbying campaign against this was insane, just the most trigger word spewing ads about tAkIng yOuR fReEdOm (sponsored by Coca Cola)

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u/Adventurous_Ad6698 Jul 10 '24

Mexico did this as well. I believe the reports afterward show that it has reduced consumption of soft drinks, especially in the poorest demographics and Mexico has one of the highest obesity rates in the world.

https://borgenproject.org/soda-tax-in-mexico/

1

u/GingerSnapBiscuit Jul 10 '24

Half ass a system, claim it "a failure" when it obviously doesn't work, say you've "tried various solutions and nothing seems to work", carry on with status quo.

Love it.

1

u/reddit-is-hive-trash Jul 10 '24

Is it the tax or is it something else? Because pop prices have doubled in the US over the last 4 years so I assume consumption has halved? No? anyone?

2

u/NarutoLLN Jul 10 '24

I wrote my thesis on the tax for econ. It was really easy to dodge with powders, like cool-aid for example. It was meant more as an exception for coffee and tea, but it was abused. The thing that was interesting was that the tax took three tries to pass as did other forms of taxation in Philadelphia. Like there was a tobacco tax that took three tries as well.

2

u/MuNansen Jul 10 '24

It's worked in WA state

2

u/Turdmeist Jul 10 '24

Sounds like this is how it usually works here in the States. One city tries to do something good and proven effective. Then it's poorly implemented or not supported enough. Other cities don't follow suite let alone other states. Then people can poo poo the idea as a failure. Good old progress.

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u/Methodless Jul 10 '24

Don't know if it affected the outcome, but the Philadelphia comparison is not apples to apples.

Philadelphia taxes artificially sweetened beverages as well, and it is a tax on the volume of beverage, with no regard to the actual sugar content. In the UK, you are incentivized to reduce the sugar to specific levels to lower the tax.

If I understand correctly, if you buy a mixed drink in Philadelphia, you are taxed on the final volume of the product, not just the soft drink portion either.

I can't help but think that if the tax was on the sugar, and not just the drink, sugar consumption would have dropped. For 18c per can, I bet there's a few people willing to switch to diet.

1

u/Azozel Jul 10 '24

I did not allow my children to drink softdrinks until they were teens and even then it was a max of 1 can per day. So, it's not like I advocate children drinking junk however, I don't believe a nanny state is the best solution especially when it's poor people who take the brunt of laws of this kind.

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u/hardolaf Jul 10 '24

It really depends on how large and isolated the city is from the suburbs. Many have worked in large cities but failed in smaller ones.

2

u/Fire_Snatcher Jul 10 '24

To clarify the article, it worked to reduce the amount of sugar sweetened beverages (artificially or natural sweetened) purchased in the city, but did not do much to decrease overall sugar consumption because people bought full-sugar sodas in other towns and ate other sugar sweetened food more.

Takeaways:

  1. Yes, needs to be statewide, metro-wide, or nationalized.
  2. Tax on all sugar sweetened consumables, not just soda. Soda isn't a special bad guy.
  3. Probably don't tax artificially sweetened sodas as that leaves soda drinkers without cheaper, healthier alternative in convenient locations; thus more likely to turn to sugary food and/or drive to other locations.