Any data on what kind of money a soda tax would raise?

I can pretty easily imagine that lots of people like the idea of something that nudges them away from unhealthy behavior.

There are whole industries built on helping people follow through on decisions that they know to be good for them, but have trouble sticking to.

Ezra, you mention this but then gloss over it: That poll doesn't give you any helpful information on taxing soda or junk food. I think many more people are likely to support taxing cigarettes and alcohol, particularly because they are often heavily taxed now, which means that a question covering a broad topic (vice and unhealthy food) gives you no meaningful data.

There is no evidence that (perhaps) people's distaste of taxing soda outweighs their want to tax cigarettes, but I don't know if this lack of evidence gives us much understanding of the public's opinion.

I personally wouldn't read much into it besides the non-smoking majority's willingness to tax cigarettes relentlessly and the civil stigma attached to smoking. Get back to us when they separate the vices, since all of the "somewhat ..." responses could well mean "alcohol and cigarrettes, but not the stuff that I indulge in."

sin taxes are more popular than raising the inheritance tax or capping charitable deductions at least in Congress

Wouldn't it be better just to end the subsidies for corn? Doesn't this indirectly make soda more expensive, and save the government what is spent on the subsidy?

KFF has data on particular taxes in the poll...

Any data on what kind of money a soda tax would raise?

USD, presumably.

I'm for taxing items to the degree that they incur costs substantially outside of baseline behavior, but not beyond that. Tax gasoline to pay for roads (because road usage varies widely and there is no baseline). Don't charge, or charge a nominal fee, for access to the national parks (because visiting a park or beach can be considered baseline. Pay for a fishing license to pay for stocking the lakes (fishing not baseline). Etc.

Cigarettes are now way overtaxed by that standard because they pay for whatever extra costs they incur* and more.

Taxing items beyond their societal costs is nothing more than the totalitarian impulse. Who gets to declare who is reprobate, and then tax them up the wazoo?

Can I get to advocate taxing various subgroups in this country (much to my advantage, I'd add) because I don't like them or don't like what they do?

I see from the chart that the question was about "unhealthy" behavior. Cute. "unhealthy" shouldn't be the standard, it should be based on costs to the government. Many of those unhealthy habits are actually very pleasurable. Omitting the unhealthy/pleasurable calculus shows where this debate is headed.

Ezra is sensible on most policy issues, but here is where he's definitely a leftist and not a liberal.

* by some measures cigarettes actually reduce costs. More health care, but quicker death and smaller Social Security payouts.

I'm in favor of expanding S-CHIP, but hate the way we're paying for it. Aside from the problem of using "sin" taxes to pay for programs (if they're successful at reducing the activity, what happens to the revenue?), it absolves people from taking responsibility for paying for the programs they say they want. And that's a fundamental problem for both parties these days.

Really, what does it say about our commitment to insuring children if we're in favor of it only if someone else picks up the tab? If it's something I care about, it's something I should be willing to do something about. And if I'm not willing to do anything about it, then maybe I should admit that I don't care about it all that much.

But Democrats seem afraid to ask people to pay for programs they say they want, and Republicans seem afraid to ask people to give up programs for the tax cuts they say they want. Neither model is sustainable. At some point, our politicians will have to ask us to make the "hard choices" that people unreasonably expect politicians to make on their own, or we'll just eventually reach a point of fiscal collapse.

In response to another post in this thread, I just read on Slate that eliminating the corn subsidy would raise the price of soft drinks by only a few cents.

Liberals: Proidly balancing their budgets on the backs of the bottom 50% since 1992.

How about a tax on unwed mothers?

Doesn't soda/soft drink add more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere?

Liberals: Proidly balancing their budgets on the backs of the bottom 50% since 1992.

That needs a fact check (as well as a spell check). As I recall, Clinton's big tax hike was on the top tax brackets, while most of the Bush tax cuts went to the very wealthy.

Instinctively recoiling from the idea of a soda tax is not so much about the soda, but about the tax. Maine had established a soda tax as "Fund for a Healthy Maine" to help pay for health insurance for a needy Maine population. A citizens' initiative, spearheaded by the Fed Up With Taxes (irrational) coalition, quickly sent the issue back to the voters where it was repealed.

The backlash was from the usual suspects complaining about taxes in general, no so much as a tax on what they should recognize as unhealthy anyway. Revenues providing additional funding for our public health system, also opposed by Fed Uppers, was something extra to complain about.

text of the law here

funding note here

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Ezra is sensible on most policy issues, but here is where he's definitely a leftist and not a liberal. That poll doesn't give you any helpful information on taxing soda or junk food.

Really, what does it say about our commitment to insuring children if we're in favor of it only if someone else picks up the tab?

Doesn't this indirectly make soda more expensive?

what kind of money a soda tax would raise?

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