|
by STEPHANIE STRAUBEL
Intern News Reporter
New York State Health Commissioner Dr. Thomas R. Frieden recently supported a proposed tax introduced by Governor David A. Paterson to implement a substantial tax on all beverages containing sugar.
The commissioner suggested “a tax of a penny per ounce could reduce consumption by more than 10 percent and raise $1.2 billion a year in New York State alone,” according to his article in the New England Journal of Medicine.
The bill proposed affixing an 18 percent tax on non-diet soft drinks, with hopes that a lofty tax would discourage consumption, remedying the obesity epidemic.
 Photo Illustration by James Fay |
The
drink tariff is inspired by the cigarette tax that reduced smoking to
21 percent in 2008, the lowest recorded number in six decades,
according to the Gallup Poll.
Such a tax could be costly to consumers in North Carolina, where sweet tea is a staple.
Cheerwine,
a locally based soft drink has experienced a recent boom in sales, with
a 28 percent increase in the Southeast over a 12 week period,
outselling Dr. Pepper and 7Up, according to the Salisbury Post.
An 18 percent tax could hurt sales and cost the native producer business as well as popularity in the state.
“People
would use less sugar,” Director of Nurses at Appalachian State
University Health Services, Beverly W. Cuthbertson said. “If people
were really intent on drinking soda, they would probably get a
sugar-free version.”
A
large soft drink on Appalachian’s campus costs $1.29 and such a tax
could put a strain on students fighting to milk their meal plans for
the whole semester.
“I
mean, I’m sure I wouldn’t buy it,” senior marketing major J. Landon
Otto said “I would just bring different drinks from home.”
Frieden said the soda tax would be an effective method of mitigating the $79 billion spent annually on obesity related issues.
Also,
it would remedy some of the costs of these issues, which range from
decreased work productivity and poor academic performance to reduced
fitness in military recruits.
These
implications are especially relevant in North Carolina, where 57
percent of the population is overweight or obese, and taxpayers dish
out $2.1 billion annually for obesity related healthcare, according to
the Center for Disease Control.
The
proposed tax was met by public outcry in the state of New York, and
Mayor Michael Bloomberg said it would not be pursued in the near
future.
President
of the American Beverage Association, Susan Neely said, “We agree that
obesity is a serious and complex problem. It defies both science and
common sense, however, to think singling out one product as a unique
contributor to obesity will make a dent in the problem.”
Trackback(0)
 |
TrackBack URI for this entry
Show/Hide comments