11–20 of 127 posts
A lot of people will point out that the difference of a relative handful of cents doesn't matter much to the individual buyer, and they're probably right. I think the change has happened largely on the supply side. Businesses didn't want to change the price of a soda and so swapped in zero-sugar versions that don't carry the tax. Anecdotally, I've noticed a distinct rise in the number of places offering several more…
This tax does not apply to diet sodas, [1] which have been shown to prompt food cravings, especially in women and obese people. [2] So it's possible that people just substituted from regular to diet soda, and still eat just as much. 1: https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/washington/articles/... 2: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/10/07/1044010...
I'm...skeptical. Mostly that in a city where houses stretch into the millions now, people forego a can of Coke over a 20 cent price increase. Soda consumption has been on a long decline since the late aughts. I even noticed as much anecdotally - often when dining out I would be the only one or maybe one of two to order a soda at all. I'm completely willing to be proven wrong, but the data set is much too small to con…
It's possible the decrease is driven largely by spending habits of low-income families: > Last year, researchers at the University of Washington found that low-income families in particular saw a significant decrease in soda consumption following the implementation of the tax. The findings were based on a survey of residents, meaning that it relied on self-reporting, which is less accurate than sales data. This leads…
Which I think, isn't really caused by their low-income, but by their greater preference for soda.
Demand changes at the margin, so a $.20 increase is a $.20 increase to everyone. It depends how much you value the soda in the first place.
I'm...skeptical. Mostly that in a city where houses stretch into the millions now, people forego a can of Coke over a 20 cent price increase. Soda consumption has been on a long decline since the late aughts. I even noticed as much anecdotally - often when dining out I would be the only one or maybe one of two to order a soda at all. I'm completely willing to be proven wrong, but the data set is much too small to con…
The problem with this sort of strategy is that we make laws by voting, and so it assumes that we can determine what is healthy by popular vote. This isn't true and it is very easily corrupted if the option is open.
A process like the one that throw out Barack Obama -> Donald Trump -> Joe Biden as the best candidates to lead the US should not be the process that decides what is and isn't healthy to eat. That isn't a reliable process. It is going to get corrupted by special interests. You should be using a different process (maybe using evidence?). And as an aside it could be argued that taxes are a bad tool if we think there is overwhelming evidence something is unhealthy. It creates weird incentives.
This tax does not apply to diet sodas, [1] which have been shown to prompt food cravings, especially in women and obese people. [2] So it's possible that people just substituted from regular to diet soda, and still eat just as much. 1: https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/washington/articles/... 2: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/10/07/1044010...
So, yes, if it is not water, with or without CO2, it should be ingested with caution.
This tax does not apply to diet sodas, [1] which have been shown to prompt food cravings, especially in women and obese people. [2] So it's possible that people just substituted from regular to diet soda, and still eat just as much. 1: https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/washington/articles/... 2: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/10/07/1044010...
I heard sweeteners are actively used in piglet farms as fattener.
I'm...skeptical. Mostly that in a city where houses stretch into the millions now, people forego a can of Coke over a 20 cent price increase. Soda consumption has been on a long decline since the late aughts. I even noticed as much anecdotally - often when dining out I would be the only one or maybe one of two to order a soda at all. I'm completely willing to be proven wrong, but the data set is much too small to con…
> The data set itself—gathered by marketing insight firm Nielsen—was huge, representing 45 percent of all food store sales in the city for 2017, 2018, and 2019.
One thing I’m curious about is whether they looked at adjacent cities. Seattle isn’t exactly an island, did the soda purchases just shift outside the city?
Did they look at restaurants and coffee shops or only grocery sales?