I agree that eating sugar in moderation doesn’t hurt you. The point with a sugar tax would be to tax excess intake of high-sugar foods and drinks, plain and simple. And you wouldn’t tax plain sugar sold to consumers of course, just processed snacks, drinks, and foods containing high levels of sugars, and especially HFCS. Sugar consumption is off the charts, especially from a historic perspective.

It would have no impact on diabetics on high-fat diets, as fat would not be taxed. (I eat lots of fat myself. I certainly wouldn’t want that.)

I also agree that aspartame is not good for you. I don’t know what you do with that one though.

The reasons for obesity in this country are complex. Some nations such as Italy and France have a rich diet and yet many of their citizens eat them and stay slim. Their lifestyles though as less frantic and less harried than Americans. Coming from an Italian background I will say eating ‘fat-free cheese’ would a national crime. Yet very few of our family are obese.

I am not saying that every obese person isn’t responsible for their intake, but American people have one of the highest stress levels in the world. And almost every food in the grocery is over-processed. If you remember from Pollan’s book on the food industry, the percentage of corn syrup in food was astoundingly high…it takes a concerted effort at the grocery store to pick up foods that are not processed either with fructose, corn syrup or extra added salt. And as Pollan says, if it has more than 4 ingredients, leave it! ;0)

Even the low-fat thrust from the 80s is now being shown to be wrong. Take out the fat and they put in the crap….load of chemicals which are creating havoc with the human body. When Americans were eating whole foods back in Grandma’s time, there was less obesity and a more satiated appetite. When you are satiated, you eat less. They also moved more than we do now. People almost are living in cars – everywhere rushing to get to work and back, or working two jobs to make ends meet.

I just read drinking coffee is helpful to your brain. But there is people still buying the decaf version which uses a chemical process to strip the caffeine. Unless you are person drinking coffee all day, 2-3 cups of coffee per day would actually be good for you.

So yes…you are correct. I wouldn’t mind seeing a higher tax on tobacco but at the same time I don’t want government to intrude into what we eat and drink or use. And boy, do I ever agree with you about PE in the schools. But the overemphasis for children on structured sports vs unstructured play is harming them. The children should play. When we were in school, we were given a full 40 minutes after lunch to go out and play. We were not allowed to sit and chat. We had to play with ball, run, jump rope, or walk around the schoolyard. It was unstructured but the exercise was enforced. There wasn’t any competition, just play…good for the mind and body. Our children are becoming mini-automatons.

Products with very high levels of sugars (sucrose, fructose, glucose) get taxed heavily. Soda pop, chocolate, ice cream, etc. are the obvious examples. Same as a tobacco tax. Nothing undemocratic about it.

Would it help? Presumably yes. Proceeds would help fund health care initiatives and social medicine (public education,) and the tax itself would encourage moderation. Could be an idea.

As I said, scientists are gradually discovering that there is a genetic component to obesity as well. I could just see the litigation now, in which grossly obese people will bring scientists to testify that they have certain genes that are known to contribute to obesity.

The whole notion of taxing obesity or penalizing obesity is ridiculous.

I’m fine with education on nutrition, taking soda machines out of schools, etc. Local schools are trying to fight the problem with better school lunches and here’s a thought–perhaps PE shouldn’t be an elective but mandatory for all ages unless you have some sort of medical condition that prevents you from participating. I’ve also read Pollan’s in defense of food and I try to ensure my family eats healthy. So if you read his books, you also know that what’s defined as ‘nutritious’ is often manipulated by the food industry, just like margarine was thought to be healthier than butter until we recently found out that guess what–transfats are worse than animal fats for you.

I’m sure obese people have tried to lose weight many times which is quite a difficult thing; it’s an entire lifestyle change and not just merely diet and exercise. As you say, it’s much more complicated than just self-discipline. We shouldn’t be making obese people feel worse about themselves, which ergo, will probably cause them to eat more. Perhaps doing simple things like having individual and business tax deductions for gym membership /having a gym on site would help more than just taxing fat people. I think Frum also had a post on eliminating farm subsidies (esp to corn and sugar which makes those items much cheaper leading to high fructose corn syrup) which I’d probably agree to. It’s nibbling around the edges at the problem and I don’t know if there would be much benefit, but the bottom line is we shouldn’t use the tax code to discriminate against people based on their weight. Esp when genetics comes into play, is quite difficult for them to control.

Education is the key to improving America’s health, not a tax on on obese people. If one uses that rule of thumb, then why not tax all those people who still smoke? Where would it end? The other fact not discussed is that fresh fruit and vegetables have gone up 40% in price. Has anyone checked out how much fresh fish costs these days?

As a child growing up in NYC in my blue-collar working family my parents bought lots of fresh fruit and vegetables and inexpensive fish – having a ribeye was a luxury . But it was because it was inexpensive.

Overprocessed (Michael Pollan’s two books on the subject are real-eyeopeners about the food industry), foods have also caused obesity rates to rise. There are hidden sugars in almost everything we eat these days. I went to join my local YMCA to swim, and found it too costly to do so. So I walk like a lot of Americans to get some exercise. But the issue is a lot more complex than it appears.

Add in our fast-paced culture….many Americans are working two jobs to make ends meet, raising families, and the guilt heaped on them to get their kids involved in after-school activities, not to mention the absurdity of some parents to enroll their kids as young as 2 y/o in organized ’sports’ is making this country a huge case of too fast too soon too much. Overeating is also a symptom of exhaustion – for many it calms the nerves. Not right of course, but I see how it could happen.

To posit that it is just a case of self-discipline is simplistic.

That’s not all. Many studies show:
“Religion appears to soothe the body as well as the soul, as people who are highly religious tend to live longer than others, a review of more than 40 scientific studies has found.”
http://www.webmd.com/news/20000809/religious-people-live-longer-than-nonbelievers

So are we going to tax single people and atheists since married and religious people have healthier lifestyles?

Of course not–to do so would be ridiculously intrusive and arbitrary–just like a so-called fat tax. What do we do–weigh people or take their BMI before they file their 1040 or pay their medical bill? Shaming an entire class of people about their weight since obesity is often associated with lower socio-economic class is about as elitist as you can get.

http://www.khnl.com/Global/story.asp?S=10836701