Ethics of a punitive junk food surtax

[Spin Echo]

Of course the caveat is that junk food, unlike alcohol, is not physically addictive and usually doesn't require rehab to stop doing.

Physically addictive no, but you get a similar reaction in the brain of obese people to that of a drug user. Similarly, whereas some people choose to self medicate with alcohol, you get people that choose to self medicate with food. People's relationship with food is complicated.

[General Zod]

Of course the caveat is that junk food, unlike alcohol, is not physically addictive and usually doesn't require rehab to stop doing.

Physically addictive no, but you get a similar reaction in the brain of obese people to that of a drug user. Similarly, whereas some people choose to self medicate with alcohol, you get people that choose to self medicate with food. People's relationship with food is complicated.

You're confusing a psychological dependence with physical addiction. Unlike alcoholics, for example, most people won't have uncontrollable cravings for chocolate and suffer withdrawal if they don't have any after not eating some for so long.

[Spin Echo]

Physically addictive no, but you get a similar reaction in the brain of obese people to that of a drug user. Similarly, whereas some people choose to self medicate with alcohol, you get people that choose to self medicate with food. People's relationship with food is complicated.

You're confusing a psychological dependence with physical addiction. Unlike alcoholics, for example, most people won't have uncontrollable cravings for chocolate and suffer withdrawal if they don't have any after not eating some for so long.

You obviously haven't seen me when I haven't had chocolate in a while.

I'm a bit hazy with preceise definitions between psychological and physical addictions, but my point was that there is appears to be a biological basis for why people overeat. The lowered number of dopamine receptors in the brain is the similar to that in people that use cocaine, making them more sensitive to the rewarding properties of food. Bulimia is believe to be caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain. Whether this is psychological or physical, these things compell people to eat more than they need.

[His Divine Shadow]

This feels kinda relevant but Penn & Teller has a new season up. First episode apparently going to be about obesity. Go watch it americans and tell us what you think.

[Mange]

This feels kinda relevant but Penn & Teller has a new season up. First episode apparently going to be about obesity. Go watch it americans and tell us what you think.

Here's an episode description:

Penn & Teller reveal truths about the Obesity epidemic. A visit to an Obesity conference exposes the uncomfortably cozy relationships between the medical establishment, the diet companies and the weight loss industry. An advocacy group for overweight people tells us about the hardships and discrimination brought about by their weight. Plus, the first-ever Penn & Teller 'Fat Guy Olympics.'

I quit watching the show (with its aptly name) after the episode which dealt with the environment. They used the same arguments the global warming deniers are using, for example the argument that scientists in the seventies said that the Earth was heading for an ice age. If they had bothered to do some research, they would've found that the claim is without basis and that the claim was brought forward not by scientific journals, but by media outlets, that the discussion was about why the temperature was lower despite increasing amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere and that the reason for the cooling period has been established (the high concentration of sulphate aerosols in the atmosphere).

[Spin Echo]

It's alive! Hopefully the thread doesn't eat too many brains...

It appears we may have a current test case as to whether a punative junk food tax will affect people's eating habits.The Norwegians are looking to institute increase the tax on junk food and get rid of it on fruits and vegetables.

Tax may rise on soft drinks
Norway's government is considering imposing higher, punitive taxes on "unhealthy" products like soft drinks and reducing or removing sales tax on fresh fruit and vegetables. There's disagreement, though, over how high the tax might be.
Politicians are considering taxing soft drinks more heavily...
...and cutting taxes on fruit and vegetables.

Norway has a long tradition of punitively taxing luxury items and products like alcoholic beverages and tobacco. Now the politicians are going after products that contain a lot of sugar, or are considered unhealthy.

That includes soft drinks and sweets, including chocolate. The current center-left coalition government already has eased taxes on sparkling water and raised them a bit on sugary sodas.

Some health advocates are arguing in favour of doubling the local version of sales tax (25 percent VAT called "moms") on soft drinks (called brus in Norway) and removing tax from fruit. "The problem is that we eat much too much sugar... too little fruit and vegetables, and too many processed foods like potato chips," Haakon Meyer, leader of a national nutrition council (Nasjonalt råd for ernæring) told newspaper Aftenposten.

A formal report from the ruling government coalition claims that "special taxes on unhealthy products can be one of several methods of improving nutrition among the population." Health Minister Sylvia Brustad remains non-commital about what measures may ultimately be taken.

"I can't say anything about what or when (any changes will occur)," she told Aftenposten. That's apparently because the three parties making up the government have different opinions on the matter, and need to iron out their differences first.

A random sampling of consumer opinion seems to support a change. "When a liter of milk costs as much as a soft drink, something's wrong," said Helene Drivenes of Ås, one of several consumers questioned by Aftenposten.

I guess we'll just have to go to Sweden for our chocolate and soda along with our beer and meat.

[Darth Wong]

Unless the tax is heavy, it won't make a difference. If (for example) a bag of chips went from $1.79 to $1.99 thanks to a junk food tax, I don't even know if most people would notice. But they'd notice if the price shot up by double or more. At the very least, 330 mL of pop at the variety store should not cost less than 330 mL of juice.

[Ghost Rider]

Just to add to Mike's point, look at cigarettes. The tax on it is constantly rising and none of the companies are suffering heavily. For a Junk Food Tax to be effective, it would have to come close to triple in price or something outlandish or people won't give a fuck.

[Nova Andromeda]

Juice is quite expensive considering how much I drink every day (I drink water and some milk btw). I know that I avoid buying it due to price. Perhaps a combination of subsidizing juice and taxing pop? One would also need to tax juice that has added sugar which I think is a real problem as well.

Cigarettes is a horrible example considering that nicotine is extremely addictive.

[Ghost Rider]

Juice is quite expensive considering how much I drink every day (I drink water and some milk btw). I know that I avoid buying it due to price. Perhaps a combination of subsidizing juice and taxing pop? One would also need to tax juice that has added sugar which I think is a real problem as well.

Cigarettes is a horrible example considering that nicotine is extremely addictive.

And junk food isn't?

Given the fact that America literally faces an obeseity problem as high as we do? It's coming damn close, and the point was people will feed their addiction UNLESS you make it so exorbiant that it becomes unreasonable, and even then, some will not care.

And juice is expensive simply because of the materials involved, the more pure the more expensive.

[Spin Echo]

Unless the tax is heavy, it won't make a difference. If (for example) a bag of chips went from $1.79 to $1.99 thanks to a junk food tax, I don't even know if most people would notice. But they'd notice if the price shot up by double or more. At the very least, 330 mL of pop at the variety store should not cost less than 330 mL of juice.

Considering how the Norwegians love to tax, I wouln't put it past them. But no, I doubt that raising the sales tax to 50% on the items will affect things too much.

I probably should have slapped an emoticon on the end of the Sweden statement.

[Nova Andromeda]

Juice is quite expensive considering how much I drink every day (I drink water and some milk btw). I know that I avoid buying it due to price. Perhaps a combination of subsidizing juice and taxing pop? One would also need to tax juice that has added sugar which I think is a real problem as well.

Cigarettes is a horrible example considering that nicotine is extremely addictive.

And junk food isn't?

Given the fact that America literally faces an obeseity problem as high as we do? It's coming damn close, and the point was people will feed their addiction UNLESS you make it so exorbiant that it becomes unreasonable, and even then, some will not care.

And juice is expensive simply because of the materials involved, the more pure the more expensive.

-I absolutely love for you to show me the scientific findings that show "junk food" is even remotely as addictive as nicotine.
-Do you have a reason that expensive good foods shouldn't be heavily subsidized to make them more attractive to lower income people? Food can be quite expensive and I see no reason to starve the poor so you can make less americans obese. Notice that we could also heavily tax junk foods.

[Spin Echo]

Considering how the Norwegians love to tax, I wouln't put it past them. But no, I doubt that raising the sales tax to 50% on the items will affect things too much.

On second thought, the alcohol tax is only 66% and there are plenty of people willing to make the drive to Sweden where the alcohol tax is less (~50% I believe), so perhaps you will see some sort of effect from the law.

[Ghost Rider]

Juice is quite expensive considering how much I drink every day (I drink water and some milk btw). I know that I avoid buying it due to price. Perhaps a combination of subsidizing juice and taxing pop? One would also need to tax juice that has added sugar which I think is a real problem as well.

Cigarettes is a horrible example considering that nicotine is extremely addictive.

And junk food isn't?

Given the fact that America literally faces an obeseity problem as high as we do? It's coming damn close, and the point was people will feed their addiction UNLESS you make it so exorbiant that it becomes unreasonable, and even then, some will not care.

And juice is expensive simply because of the materials involved, the more pure the more expensive.

-I absolutely love for you to show me the scientific findings that show "junk food" is even remotely as addictive as nicotine.
-Do you have a reason that expensive good foods shouldn't be heavily subsidized to make them more attractive to lower income people? Food can be quite expensive and I see no reason to starve the poor so you can make less americans obese. Notice that we could also heavily tax junk foods.

1. Yes, because the centuries of demonstrating the processed sugar is not one of the best selling products on the planet proves nothing at all. We consume it because it's healthy for us.

2. Gee, where did I say anything about not lowering the amount? Oh wait, I pointed it that juice is expensive because the material that is needed is not cheap. Oh wait, I see you want to produce a mountain out of nothing.

[darthbob88]

-I absolutely love for you to show me the scientific findings that show "junk food" is even remotely as addictive as nicotine.

There's this for starters. Brookhaven Nat'l Labs and the pages it links to.
Then there's this.

Both of those were found with 5 minutes of weak google-fu.

[Nova Andromeda]

-I absolutely love for you to show me the scientific findings that show "junk food" is even remotely as addictive as nicotine.

There's this for starters. Brookhaven Nat'l Labs and the pages it links to.
Then there's this.

Both of those were found with 5 minutes of weak google-fu.

-I'd hardly call "food-deprived subjects" addicts. Of course, there are cases where people's brains are miswired and they crave food more than they should. However, eating food certainly doesn't cause this "addiction" and most people that eat food don't become food "addicts" without other factors being involved (such as depression). Furthermore, you'll note that I specifically targetted "junk food" (since that's the subject in question) while your pathetic attempt at googlefu only got you food in general.

1. Yes, because the centuries of demonstrating the processed sugar is not one of the best selling products on the planet proves nothing at all. We consume it because it's healthy for us.

-Your hyperbole not withstanding people don't generally suffer chemical withdrawal if one day they stop eating processed sugar and start eating strawberries do they?

2. Gee, where did I say anything about not lowering the amount? Oh wait, I pointed it that juice is expensive because the material that is needed is not cheap. Oh wait, I see you want to produce a mountain out of nothing.

-You brought it up and I don't appreciate distractionary attacks on my motives. Perhaps you didn't have a specific point or you thought I didn't know why juice costs more? However given the context, it wasn't unreasonable for me to think you were objecting to my suggestion of a subsidy for healthy food instead of just a tax on "junk food."

[Darth Wong]

I don't give a fuck whether food is just as addictive as tobacco. It is causing deaths on a similar order of magnitude as tobacco, which is the most important thing. Whether it's a psychological addiction or a chemical addiction is totally immaterial, when the results are similar.

[TheLemur]

Unless the tax is heavy, it won't make a difference. If (for example) a bag of chips went from $1.79 to $1.99 thanks to a junk food tax, I don't even know if most people would notice. But they'd notice if the price shot up by double or more. At the very least, 330 mL of pop at the variety store should not cost less than 330 mL of juice.

On second thought, the alcohol tax is only 66% and there are plenty of people willing to make the drive to Sweden where the alcohol tax is less (~50% I believe), so perhaps you will see some sort of effect from the law.

People will act very weird under these conditions. On the one hand, unless the price of something suddenly doubles, most people won't notice at all because stores regularly change prices and advertise 30%, 40%, 50%-off sales to try and bring in customers. On the other hand, people will drive quite a long ways and change their buying habits to avoid even a 5% tax. I guess there's just something intrinsically horrible about taxes. Or maybe people are just familiar with them; it's easy to understand how you'll be charged a tax unless you do XYZ, but monitoring prices and comparing them across stores for a wide range of products requires actual work.