UK is introducing a new soft drink tax.

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http://www.bbc.com/news/health-43659124

The UK is taxing soft drinks even more. I think that this is a good thing. I've never understood why so many people are against soft drink taxes.

In the West, unhealthy foods are cheaper than healthy foods. This is why so many people are fat. This is why so many people have heart disease.

By taxing junk food, the UK government can fund healthcare, education, and other things that help people. Why is this such a controversial issue?

because making s**t foods more expensive isn't going to make healthy foods cheaper.

Because of the sugar tax, most soft drinks now include carcinogenic sweeteners instead of sugar, even the main ones that aren’t named sugar-free or reduced sugar in any way.

At restaurants and takeaways all of their softdrinks except Coca Cola now all contain artificial sweeteners. It’s going backwards.

We have the same thing in America (but not Canada, last I checked). I have to check labels all the time now.

Not to mention, artificial sweeteners cause diabetes, too.

They have done this in Seattle. $1.75 per ounce. That's a ridiculously high charge. Seattle isn't that huge of a city and people can just go over to neighboring cities to avoid it.

Kern's Nectar variety pack $11.99 + $6.03 City of Seattle Sweetened Beverage Recovery Fee = $18.02

The problem I see with this is the ol slippery slope of what's next? And if tax starts at $1.75, how high will it go?

It's said the tax will directly impact small businesses in a negative way and it also targets the working class.

Last edited by EzraS on 06 Apr 2018, 5:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Why would anybody consider nectar to be "bad" for you?

It's a naturally-occurring substance.

I can understand sweetened cokes or something being "bad" for you.

But not nectar.

From what I read, Kern's Nectar is made with whole fruit; No high fructose corn syrup; 100% natural. So I guess this tax will include all fruit juices? Orange juice for breakfast will be an extra $1.75 per ounce? Absolutely ridiculous if true.

They say this will have a negative impact on small business and that it targets the working class.

I wondered about Starbucks going through the roof in Seattle, but apparently the tax doesn't apply to them.

Last edited by EzraS on 06 Apr 2018, 5:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Me too, some sweeteners give me headaches.

I wonder if the tax will apply to just sugar, or sugar alcohols too, since some also contain a significant amount of calories relative to something like aspartame. Like xylitol.

Some general rules about fruit juice:


1) If it’s a juice drink, it’s not 100% fruit juice.

2) If it’s made with or from whole fruit, it’s a term food companies use to trick the consumer. It sounds healthy but it isn’t necessarily so. It means they’ve added other ingredients, unless they explicitly say it’s 100% fruit juice.

3) Free from artificial colourings and flavourings still means they add colours, and artificial flavourings sometimes disguised as “natural flavour/ing” or “natural aroma”.

4) Most drinks and food that is processed and marked as healthy or natural, usually is not. I’m not preaching, that is actually the case. I think this is the main reason why the average person hasn’t a clue what is healthy and what isn’t. Some “healthy” food is really high in calories and sugar, like granola.

I think only limiting food that is obviously bad for people is not the answer, it’s educating people on what not to believe from the food companies, who completely mislead the public all the time. I think it’s just the governments pretending to tackle the problem without trying at all.

Nectar is a naturally occurring substance. Bees use it to make honey. We can't tax that.



The whole point of this tax is to fight against obesity. You have to admit that obesity is a huge problem in the West because unhealthy foods are less expensive than nutritious foods.

Once obesity is no longer a problem, these laws won't go any further.

This is why slippery slope is a logical fallacy. Philosophers don't just create logical fallacies on a whim.

The slippery slope fallacy is what you get when you falsely assume that progress just happens for the sake of progress. It's what you get when you don't even consider the source of social change.



Do you know what also impacts the working class? Obesity.



This tax could fund programs that help poor people, such as healthcare.

Perhaps the UK government will use this tax money to provide everyone in the UK with free water.

I, personally, think that water should be the only free drink, as it is the only drink that is necessary for human life. Unhealthy drinks should be taxed so that the government can provide free drinking water.

Water is a human need, and I believe that any human need is also a human right.

In Australia we have bans on selling things like junk food and alcohol in remote indigenous (aboriginal) communities
The experiment has limited success as people find a way to get around it or use alternatives like sniffing glue or petrol

For example cigarettes are exorbitantly expensive for poor people in Australia...however companies like Phillip-Morris are still maintaining production as the biggest buyers are black marketeers who sell on through unregulated channels

Are more mature process would be to educate about the dangers of sugar rather than trying to tax it...but sugar is addictive so i can also see the benefits of making it less accessible

Pah! With the UK government cutting back our benefits, free school meals, NHS, police and fire services, I highly doubt they would give us anything back. They’re just going to make everyone poorer, which is what they’re aiming for.

Do you bother providing them with running water or electricity?

I'm asking because many Native American reservations are basically Hoovervilles.



Everyone already knows about the dangers of eating sugary foods. As children, we are (rightfully) taught that sugar causes cavities, diabetes and obesity. As adults, we learn that the brutal, depressing economic system in which we live really puts our self-control to the test.

Watch a documentary by journalist John Pilger, http://johnpilger.com/videos/utopia
it gives a good insight into life on remote aboriginal communities...I can warn you it's not pleasant viewing that human beings are treated like this in the 21st century



Its likely education should be aimed in early childhood as for adults it's harder to give up their sweet tooth

Soft drinks aren't food. And restaurant food is more expensive than healthy food one buys at the store. Foods like bred, pasta and potatoes are loaded with sugar. That's why people with diabetes have to avoid them. People get obese on high starch sugar carb foods and foods with fat content. Also overeating period causes obesity. Taxing soft drinks is not going to make obesity go away. The government will have to regulate everything people eat and in what quantities in order to control obesity through government intervention.

Last edited by EzraS on 06 Apr 2018, 7:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.