Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Soda Tax - WTF?!?
A new federal tax on soda and other sugary beverages has been suggested recently as a way to pay for part of the major overhaul of the U.S. health-care system proposed by the Obama administration.
According to the Wall Street Journal, "The Center for Science in the Public Interest, a Washington-based watchdog group that pressures food companies to make healthier products, plans to propose a federal excise tax on soda, certain fruit drinks, energy drinks, sports drinks and ready-to-drink teas. It would not include most diet beverages."
Supporters argue that the tax would have multiple benefits. In addition to partially funding health-care reform, supporters argue that a tax on sugary beverages would likely discourage their consumption, potentially relieving some of the burden on taxpayers covering the medical costs incurred because of overweight and obesity.
Addressing these issues, a recent article from the New England Journal of Medicine reports, "For each extra can or glass of sugared beverage consumed per day, the likelihood of a child?s becoming obese increases by 60 percent," and that "a review conducted by Yale University?s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity suggested that for every 10 percent increase in price, consumption decreases by 7.8 percent."
Finally, the article states that "The contribution of unhealthful diets to health care costs is already high and is increasing ? an estimated $79 billion is spent annually for overweight and obesity alone ? and approximately half of these costs are paid by Medicare and Medicaid, at taxpayers? expense. Diet-related diseases also cost society in terms of decreased work productivity, increased absenteeism, poorer school performance, and reduced fitness on the part of military recruits, among other negative effects."
The same Wall Street Journal article notes that "The main beverage lobby that represents Coca-Cola Co., PepsiCo Inc., Kraft Foods Inc. and other companies said such a tax would unfairly hit lower-income Americans and wouldn't deter consumption.
'Taxes are not going to teach our children how to have a healthy lifestyle,' said Susan Neely, president of the American Beverage Association. Instead, the association says it's backing programs that limit sugary beverage consumption in schools."
What do you think of a tax on sugary beverages? Would you support it?
I can't believe this! The taxpayer gets totalled shafted! "Sugary beverages" are made completely from corn, including HFCS, caramel color, and all the preservatives. The reason why corn is so cheap is that it gets HUGE SUBSIDIES from the government, allowing corn to be grown below the cost of production. That's our taxpayer money! And now since the Federal Government has created a sugary monster, they want to tax us for consuming it?!? Taxed at both ends! Give me a fvcking break! The government should cut the subsidies, the cost of corn will go up, and the cost of soda will increase. The end result is the same as a tax, the price of soda increases. This is a better option than a revolving door of money to corn agribusiness. Government taxes us, gives money to corn growers, corn growers sell cheap corn, Coca-Cola turns cheap corn into soda making big profits, consumer gets taxed on the cheap product, and the money goes back to the corn industry. Good grief!
Re: Soda Tax - WTF?!?
I definitely hear your logic although, I kind of always wished they'd put extra taxes on unhealthy foods to subsidize the healthy foods so those were lower cost. Like, frozen french fries cost an extra $.25 so bags of potatoes can cost $.25 less or something like that (prob not the best example) or like oreos cost $.25 more so apples can cost $.25 less. I kind of feel like that rewards the people for eating healthy, gives people on a budget healthier options, and discourages the unhealthy products.
I don't think this would ever happen, but a girl can dream right?
While I sort of see the logic in this, I think it is kind of an assumption that people who drink soda are eating an entirely unhealthy diet. For example, I drink coke--on a regular basis, but for the most part, I also eat a diet of healthy, unprocessed foods. I'm probably not the only person out there who does this.
While I sort of see the logic in this, I think it is kind of an assumption that people who drink soda are eating an entirely unhealthy diet. For example, I drink coke--on a regular basis, but for the most part, I also eat a diet of healthy, unprocessed foods. I'm probably not the only person out there who does this.
Oh absolutely I know not everyone does, but it seems like for the most part near me, most folks who are eating poorly are kind of going the whole way - I'm just thinking if they used the tax to subsidize healthy food, then it would balance out wouldn't it if you had a mix of healthy and unhealthy food? Pay the extra $ on soda...save it on the healthy stuff...
You know what..I wrote this, and then I read what you said and I felt kinda like a dope b/c for a person like me it absolutely would balance out ;D For some reason I just wanted to point out that it's not all or nothing!
I think the Soda tax is a good thing. We as a country have a big problem with obesity. And soda is an everyday drink for most kids instead of a treat. If we could avoid this at least in a small percent of the population, great. (Lets not go into the fact that we export our lifestyle to developing countries...)
And I wonder what this would do to fast food and restaurant profit margins? I know a lot of the profit comes from selling soda.