Bill would raise cost of sugary beverages Sun, The (San Bernardino, CA) - Sunday, May 2, 2010 Author: Jim Steinberg, Staff Writer
In a country where nearly $150 billion is spent dealing with the health ramifications of obesity, is a tax on the sugar in beverages a good idea or a bad one?
Rumblings for these kinds of taxes are being heard in about dozen revenue-starved states and several cities across the country.
In California, Senate Majority Leader Dean Florez , D-Shafter, has introduced legislation to levy an excise tax of a penny per teaspoon of sugar in soda and other sweetened beverages.
The tax would raise $1.5 billion a year, which would support physical education for high school seniors and beef up physical education in kindergarten through eighth grades, Florez said.
It would also go to county recreation programs with goals to promote youth activities.
"Unlike most of the proposals (for a tax on sweetened beverages), this does not go into the general fund," he said.
Costs related to obesity in California are estimated at $41 billion a year. Florez said that if the state can free up $5 billion or $6 billion by reducing the number of obese people, that will relieve pressure to raise taxes overall.
Because there are 17 teaspoons of sugar in a 20-ounce bottle of soda, the tax proposed by Florez would add 17 cents to the price.
At a San Bernardino convenience mart recently, a 20-ounce plastic bottle of Coca-Cola cost $1.59. Add the 9 percent sales tax and the five-cent California Redemption Value charge and the drink costs $1.79.
Make that $1.96 if this bill becomes law.
"Taxes are supposed to be a simple method to raise tax money for government," said J. Justin Wilson, senior research analyst at the Washington-based Center for Consumer Freedom.
Using its powers to encroach on personal freedoms "is a form of social engineering ... an inappropriate exercise of governmental power," Wilson said.
In a position paper advocating the tax, Florez said: "There is overwhelming evidence of the link between obesity and consumption of sweetened beverages such as soft drinks, sweet teas, and sports drinks. Americans now consume 278 additional calories (daily) than they were in 1977. Of those 278 additional calories, 120 can be attributed to sugar sweetened beverages.
"For every additional serving of sweetened beverage that a child consumers per day, the likelihood of the child becoming obese increases by 60 percent. Yet, research shows that 41 percent of California children age 2-11 and 62 percent of California teens age 12-17 drink soda daily."
Bob Achermann, spokesman for the California/Nevada Soft Drink Association, called the tax "hugely regressive on families" and a "big hit" on one product.
"There is no disagreement in our industry that we have an obesity epidemic," he said. "But taxing one beverage product is not going to solve the problem."
Achermann said that the industry supports first lady Michelle Obama's "Let's Move!" anti-obesity campaign and backs its efforts to have calorie information on display on containers, vending and fountain machines within two years.
Because more people are buying no-calorie beverages, a key industry's measure - the number of calories per beverage-ounce sold - has dropped 28 percent between 1998 and 2008, Achermann said.
The beverage industry is offering many healthy choice products, he said.
Support for the tax doesn't appear to be impacted by a down economy.
But in a telephone survey of 503 registered California voters, 56 percent expressed support for a tax used to fund childhood obesity education programs.
In Los Angeles County, 61 percent supported this kind of measure, while 54 percent did in the rest of Southern California, which includes the Inland Empire, said Harold Goldstein, executive director, of the California Center for Public Health Advocacy.
Especially surprising in this severe economic downturn, support registered 60 percent among low-income people, Goldstein said. It was even higher for Latinos at 66 percent.
At the national level, however, a recent Thomson Reuters study of 3,000 people found 51 percent opposed a tax on sugary beverages while only 33 percent were in favor of the idea. Sixteen percent had no opinion on the issue.
A key test for the future of SB 1210 will happen May 12 when it goes before the state Senate's Revenue and Taxation Committee.
