Taxes Don't Fix Obesity

Katy Grimes: Despite the stated goal, Assemblyman Bill Monning’s proposed soda tax is just another money grab.

Just like the recently announced soda-tax approved by Sacramento’s City Council, Monning claims that his goal is to fight obesity.

Monning, a Democrat from Carmel introduced AB 669 on Thursday, which would impose a one cent-per-ounce tax on soda and sport drinks, adding at least 12 cents to every drink.

Sacramento Councilman Kevin McCarty told the Sacramento Bee, “he doesn’t want such a revenue generator in Sacramento to help solve full-scale budget problems. Instead, he said he’d like to see the money go to city-run recreational programs such as summer and after-school youth leagues, and to help fund city employees working in recreational programs at schools.”

Sacramento’s parks have lost more than 40 percent of the park workers in cuts over the last two years, instead of cutting the bloated recreation budget. And now McCarty has come up with a way to help fund those jobs. The Local 39 union members must love him.

Monning said in a press release, “It’s only fair that the sweetened beverage industry pay their fair share to address the crisis.”

But it has been widely reported that the American Beverage Association has opposed soda taxes. The association released a statement in December that said “taxes do not make people healthier,” and these charges amount to “a money grab to pay for a government that is already too expensive and too involved in (taxpayers’) personal lives.”

This is just another case of nanny government levying taxes to raise revenue. Whether the issue is smoking, transfats, seat belts, ski helmuts, or healthcare, the end result is the same — government expansion and the erosion of personal liberty.

Most people are capable of understanding the health risks of drinking too much soda — or eating too much fast food, smoking a pack of cigarettes a day, or snowboarding down the hill without a helmut on.

Those are an individual’s decisions to make, and the individual’s consequences to live with – not Assemblyman Bill Monning’s or Councilman Kevin McCarty’s. They were elected to keep the government operating within budget, which thus far, neither politician seems to be particularly clear about.

How did we ever survive without government saving us from ourselves?