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> The soda industry has poured over $67 million into defeating state and local efforts to regulate soft drink sales in the United States since 2009, according t

• mmastrac 10y ago
  They are probably aware of the pending shift in attitudes with diet sodas, ie more people becoming aware of [1] that they realize that regulation of sodas will lead to regulations of diet sodas a few short years later. [1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/09/08/the-awful-truth-about-diet-soda-and-weight-gain-according-to-science/#6d86820254d6 http://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/09/08/the-awful-truth...
• lukasm 10y ago
  1. It's not as addictive as sugar 2. Significant number of people don't like diet sodas
  • ozi 10y ago
    3. Can cause gastrointestinal pain 4. Promotes overeating
    • ashark 10y ago
      5. Aftertaste reminiscent of something that would warrant a call to poison control
      • mst 10y ago
        I have that reaction to all USian soda (am UKian) because of HFCS rather than straight up sugar. Honestly, to me, the diet stuff actually tastes slightly less awful. Weirdly, diet Tropical Tango tastes better to me than the sugared version, possibly because its flavourings are so artificial already that the artificial sweetener fits better ... or possibly just because I'm weird.
        • ashark 10y ago
          Real-sugar soda variants in the US (we do have them! And not just imported Mexican coke!) usually come in glass which makes it harder to do a useful side-by-side tasting. I do prefer them, but I'm not sure how much of that's the glass. Meanwhile, I can tell instantly when I've accidentally tasted something with artificial sweetener in it. I've even picked it out from products that have real sugar but are supplemented with a bit of something artificial, waaaaay down the ingredient list, having no idea in advance that it'd be there. [EDIT] I should add that I'd be surprised if the sugared variants typically have no difference to the HFCS sort other than subbing out the sweetener, so that's another wrinkle to attempting straight comparisons of sugar vs. HFCS
    • cantankerous 10y ago
      Doesn't regular soda fall into these categories, too?
      • Spivak 10y ago
        There are numerous studies that link artificial sugar to overeating even when you account for the self-selection bias. I'm not going to pretend to be an expert, so you should evaluate their quality for yourself but the story goes something like this. Your body uses some pretty basic heuristics in order to determine one, that you're full, and two that you're getting a sufficient caloric intake. Introducing high-volume, low-calorie foods into your diet isn't necessarily a problem, but your body will quickly determine that you need more volume to reach its caloric needs. Especially if you use diet soda / lite snacks to satisfy hunger. So when you mix 'diet' foodstuffs with normal food you will more than likely overeat on the high calorie foods leading to more weight gain. This is where philosophy for the other dieting extreme comes from. If you normally eat extremely high-calorie/low-volume foods to satisfy hunger and put up with a grumbly stomach for a while you will adjust the other direction and under-eat on normal calorie foods, ideally leading to weight loss.
        • Zergy 10y ago
          > There are numerous studies that link artificial sugar to overeating even when you account for the self-selection bias. I'm not going to pretend to be an expert, so you should evaluate their quality for yourself but the story goes something like this. Sources? This is something I spent a bit of time looking into and the consensus at the time was there was no strong consensus.
    • smsm42 10y ago
      Any food can cause gastrointestinal pain. If you eat a lot of it :) Also any food that tastes good can be reasonable claimed to "promote overeating".
  • tehlike 10y ago
    Coke zero is actually quite nice.
    • marxidad 10y ago
      I'm not a big fan of the metallic aspartame aftertaste.
      • mi100hael 10y ago
        After drinking a lot of diet Coke & Dew because soda is free in my office and I don't want to be a fat ass, I actually prefer it to the regular stuff. The regular is too sticky and sickly.
        • tehlike 10y ago
          That's what i also realized. it's still bad, but maybe a bit better than the sugary one.
      • DanBC 10y ago
        The vast majority of people can't tell the difference in double blind taste tests, especially at the cold temperatures it's served at. I reckon with properly blinded tests many people couldn't tell the difference between 7up and coke if you served it cold enough.
• dpark 10y ago
  Lots of people don't like diet soda and would stop drinking soda rather than switching to diet. The realistic outcome of heavy tax on sugary soda is a reduction in the amount of soda consumed. (Which I'd probably call a win, though obviously not a win-win.)
  • SilasX 10y ago
    Sure, as long as you ignore all the costs of people cutting their soda consumption (e.g. costs to soda drinkers that have a healthy lifestyle, loss of utility from switching to a lower-valued activity, redirection of resources to substitutes). But if you're going to make that assumption, just ban soda, since you no longer recognize any upsides to it.
  • tomjen3 10y ago
    There will almost certainly be some reduction (unless soda becomes a Veblen good, which seems unlikely but not impossible) the question is how much the price elasticity is. I found a scientific paper[1] that suggest that under some ideal conditions I am not sure apply to reality a 10% tax means 10% less less consumption. However what do they then consume? A switch from diet cola to juice would be bad from a sugar perspective and a switch to milk would be bad from a caloric perspective. Sparkling water is better from both perspectives but it is worse for your teeth than regular water [2] plain tea seems mixed [3] but realistically would you expect most people to switch to plain tea or tea with tons of sugar? [1]: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1570677X15000611 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1570677X15... [2]: http://www.today.com/health/sparkling-water-bad-your-teeth-dentists-weigh-t70761 http://www.today.com/health/sparkling-water-bad-your-teeth-d... [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_of_tea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_of_tea
    • snovv_crash 10y ago
      Why not just drink water? Why does your drink need flavors? And anyway, the sparkling water will still be better for teeth than the soda. Don't let perfect get in the way of good.
• qpalz 10y ago
  My city attempted a large tax on sugary beverages only, but they ended up compromising with the opponents of the bill and implemented half the beverage tax on diet as well as sugary drinks. It seems like once the regulation for soft drinks is on the table, it's only a matter of time before diet sodas are included
  • nitrogen 10y ago
    Is diet soda really any better with regard to health? I was under the impression that the sweet taste without the calories causes problems with insulin or satiety or something (can't recall details).
    • blacksmith_tb 10y ago
      There's some evidence that artificial sweeteners have a negative effect on the human gut[1]. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/artificial-sweeteners-may-change-our-gut-bacteria-in-dangerous-ways/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/artificial-sweete...
      • snovv_crash 10y ago
        That is compared to water, not sugary drinks. People aren't drinking diet drinks as a replacement to water, they are drinking them as a replacement for sugary drinks.
  • ZeroGravitas 10y ago
    That seems a weird compromise. Who is against a soda tax, but pro a tax on diet soda? I would have thought most big soda manufacturers sell both, and even if you only sold non-diet soda, you think it would be easier to pivot to diet soda than push for legislation to raise it's price.
• adanto6840 10y ago
  Personally, I'd really prefer to not pay inflated costs for soda, should I choose to consume it. I am however completely and 100% fine with paying a higher i.e. health insurance premium due to my soda drinking habit (or any other habit that causes my health risk to be higher). I'm just not a big fan of 'sin taxes' -- though I could be persuaded if they were actually put to use in the same way that the health insurance/risk concept would be; I'm just not convinced that's actually what would happen in the long or short term.
  • komali2 10y ago
    I like your idea, but it seems like then the government (or somebody) would have to have a guaranteed way to detect whether or not you're drinking soda, smoking, etc. Seems invasive.
    • michaelt 10y ago
      If the only argument for a soda tax is the externalised costs of obesity healthcare, why not just charge people for obesity healthcare? After all, someone who drinks soda and does a lot of exercise or hard work might not impose any cost on the health system - and someone who eats a lot of bacon or home-baked cakes might get obese without drinking any soda.
      • deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
      • marxidad 10y ago
        Obesity isn't strictly a lifestyle choice for everyone afflicted with it.
      • deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
    • stuaxo 10y ago
      If you pay with a bank card or use a loyalty card that exists already. As for the tax, it doesn't need to be applied at the point of sale, but can be further back in the chain.
• riazrizvi 10y ago
  There's more money in sugar-addicted fat people. Even in the US, drug and food policy is coordinated (see FDA drug approval board https://academic.oup.com/jnci/article/100/5/296/938813/Members-of-New-FDA-Board-Tied-to-Industry https://academic.oup.com/jnci/article/100/5/296/938813/Membe...). It's a big industry where profitable addictive foods also support a lucrative obesity healthcare industry ($190bn in the US, https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/obesity-prevention-source/obesity-consequences/economic/ https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/obesity-prevention-source/obesi...).
  • mtgx 10y ago
    > It's a big industry where profitable addictive foods also support a lucrative obesity healthcare industry And that's the crux of the problem, isn't it? If the U.S. had a single-payer healthcare system, you can bet it would care a lot more about issues like obesity, pollution, and all the things that make people sick and would make the government pay more for healthcare. It would have an incentive to reduce those issues. Instead, the U.S. has a system where it's "profitable" to have sick people, so the stuff that makes people sick is kept in place. It's the same kind of the same perverse incentives we see with the private prison industry.
    • anigbrowl 10y ago
      I agree 100%, but have you see the rhetoric from people who think soda tax is just another big gubmint shakedown and that healthy food is being forced down our throats etc. etc.? There's a lot of people who have, well, brainwashed. I hate using that word because people of any political persuasion can and do get into an intellectual echo chamber where their worldview is reaffirmed by the social circles they inhabit and the media they consume. But whenever I put time aside to actively listen to a few hours of talk radio (which is dominated by Tea Party types) my brain just wants to escape from between my ears. I feel this is reflected in the present administration's explicit disregard for facts, data and evidence. Are you familiar with 4th generation war theories? If you're interested drop me a line at gmail and I'll direct you to some fascinating reading.
      • 10y ago
• monocasa 10y ago
  $67M is probably a drop in the bucket for them.
  • mikeyouse 10y ago
    It's definitely a drop in the bucket.. The combined revenue for PepsiCo and CocaCola is over $100 billion per year. $10 million/year fighting against soda taxes represents 0.01% of their revenue. I'd be surprised if they were only spending $10m/year.
    • zzleeper 10y ago
      1) The relevant metric is net income not revenue (that's what at stake for them) 2) Those figures are worldwide, not just for Mexico. That said, I wouldn't be surprised it's not Coke and Pepsi directly behind the spying, but FEMSA and other bottlers. After all, why would Coke risk its huge brand when the bottlers, who have as much as stake, are Mexican, and are thus better to "influence things over there"
• 33W 10y ago
  1. the soda industry poured over... 2. I was just listening to a Stuff you should know on artificial sweeteners, and it seems that there's some downsides to diet sodas as well. One example was that the non-calorie sweetener reduced the body/brain's relation between sweetness and calories. This causes the body not to recognize other sweet things (full sugar drinks/candy, carbs, etc) as caloric.
• azernik 10y ago
  They do both.
• tn13 10y ago
  > The soda industry has poured over $67 million into defeating state and local efforts to regulate soft drink sales in the United States since 2009, according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest. That seems like a very tiny amount compared to the profits we are looking at. I mean Let us say if you are focusing on 10 major US cities + DC then it is merely $6M per city. Isn't that too tiny an amount to get anything done ?
  • vkou 10y ago
    Political lobbying has some of the highest RoI a business can hope for. At a municipal level, a few hundred dollars can be sufficient to turn a councilor, get access to edit legislature as it is written, or just get your proposed legislature accepted as verbatim. If the local media doesn't make a stink of it, you'll get away with it, too.
    • kevin_thibedeau 10y ago
      > get access to edit legislature as it is written In the US most legislation is already written by the lobbyists themselves.
      • vkou 10y ago
        ... Because they have access. Through lobbying. It's not a state of nature.
• rhino369 10y ago
  These taxes often include taxes on sugar-free versions too.