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Children's daily sugar consumption halved just a year after tax, study finds

117 points by doener 2y ago

sublinear 2y ago
Is this how we want to do this? Taxes... really? We should strongly question why this is the most effective means rather than blindly pursuing that it works and digging ourselves a deeper hole.
- xen0 2y ago
  Would you prefer an outright ban?
  - sublinear 2y ago
    No.
- drekipus 2y ago
  In absence of a big stick, yes! People aren't going to will themselves to personal responsibility
- alias_neo 2y ago
  Can't have those poor people having sugar in their diet, it's bad for them. Sugar is for the rich.
  - spacebanana7 2y ago
    There’s actually a paradoxical situation in most developed countries where the poorer you are, the more likely you are to be overweight. Making unhealthy food too expensive for poor people is a blunt instrument of course, but it does have an empirical case. https://www.bmj.com/content/356/bmj.j163# https://www.bmj.com/content/356/bmj.j163#
    - rightbyte 2y ago
      Unhealthy food is allready way more expansive than cooking your own. I guess the main culprit is lack of energy and time to cook, not the price.
      - actionfromafar 2y ago
        Time is a kind of a price too. Also, look up "food desert" some time. It's real.
      - alias_neo 2y ago
        I disagree when it comes to the UK. Healthy food; fresh fruit, vegetables and meat is significantly more expensive than processed food. There are/were plenty of British YouTuber's doing "how cheap can you eat" meals through COVID and the cost of living crisis, they started at ~£1 for a bare-bones meal for one, they were at ~£1.50 last I looked; that's hopefully improving with the recent falls in inflation, but still and issue for many. Of course the same demographic who can't afford the ingredients to cook their own healthy meals can often also not afford the time to prepare them either; due to working long hours, not being able to afford care for their children, etc. Food banks are very much on the rise in many parts of the UK[0] and we have millions of children in poverty[1], a significant and heart breaking statistic for such a country. [0] https://www.trusselltrust.org/news-and-blog/latest-stats/end-year-stats/#factsheets https://www.trusselltrust.org/news-and-blog/latest-stats/end... [1] https://cpag.org.uk/child-poverty/poverty-facts-and-figures https://cpag.org.uk/child-poverty/poverty-facts-and-figures
    - alias_neo 2y ago
      I think everyone missed the sarcasm my comment was dripping with, British humour I guess. I'll take the downvotes. I understand the issues with sugar, I have no arguments with it, but it is, as you say, a blunt instrument. Sadly, the opposite case; healthy food, is also too expensive for the same demographic this affects; that's a separate and independent problem though, and the evidence in OP seems to suggest the tax is (somewhat) effective, so, again, no arguments from me. EDIT: To be clear, I'm talking about in the UK when I talk about a demographic.
- petepete 2y ago
  It works and it works quickly. What else would?
  - sublinear 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - petepete 2y ago
      You answered it yourself. Parents don't know/care, their kids bare the brunt. Taxing isn't ideal and is a blunt instrument at best - but I'm not convinced there's a better (working) alternative.
      - ollybee 2y ago
        I don't think it is a blunt instrument, in fact I'd say the complete opposite. It's been a nudge of industry in a direction that's better for society, in a way that keeps that playing field level for different manufacturers, reduced their overall tax burden and not cost consumers anything. All this while avoiding any harsh ban, you can still buy high sugar drinks if you wish.
  - GrassTheKayaks 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - sublinear 2y ago
      [flagged]
    - petepete 2y ago
      No sensible solutions then, par for the course!
    - YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
      Think about how you’d actually implement that policy. It’d be political suicide. I can see the ‘literally killing children’ headlines already. No law can change anything if it can’t make it through the Commons.
- smoothbran 2y ago
  If you're allergic to the word tax, then think of it more as a fee. If you want to sell a soda in the UK that is greater than X% sugar, you pay an additional, relatively small, fee. There are a lot of externalities from having an unhealthy populace, this fee can help to counter that.
  - sublinear 2y ago
    Why in the hell would anyone need to pay a tax for this is my question. Sounds like a racket to me. What's next?
    - waciki 2y ago
      You're not replying to OP > There are a lot of externalities from having an unhealthy populace, this fee can help to counter that.
      - skatebear 2y ago
        Is this tax sized to cover for that externalities or the amount is decided in other basis (likely to maximize government revenue)? Is the collected money exclusively used to counter the externalities or is the spending left to the discretion of the government? I'm asking from ignorance, but if the answer of any of those questions is no then the purpose of the tax is not to make up for the externalities.
        rsynnott 2y ago
        > Is this tax sized to cover for that externalities No, nothing like it. The final costs to the state of excessive sugar consumption are _vast_. This levy is primarily to discourage people from consuming loads of sugar. > Is the collected money exclusively used to counter the externalities While I don't know, I'd be very surprised. That sort of bucketed approach to tax collection/use is _extremely_ inefficient; the only place it can possibly be justified is social insurance.
    - xen0 2y ago
- Skeime 2y ago
  I think a tax or levy is somewhat reasonable, but then should go towards paying for sugar-induced costs (mostly healthcare, I'd assume).
- Bancakes 2y ago
  they’ve been putting made up dietary pyramids in schools for decades, and it hasn’t worked.
- tene80i 2y ago
  Who says it’s blindly pursuing anything, or indeed a hole of any depth? It works because it increases the price, which reduces demand and leads suppliers to change recipes. What is your concern?
- CalRobert 2y ago
  How else would you do it? Is it bad we tax cigarettes too? I’m open to the argument that it -is- bad, actually, but a tax seems like a reasonable approach if you want people to drink less sugar.
- frereubu 2y ago
  It's not good enough to just ask questions like that - what alternatives are there? The information that too much sugar is bad for you isn't exactly hidden away, yet rates of obesity, tooth decay and diabetes are still going up.
  - sublinear 2y ago
    > It's not good enough to just ask questions like that - what alternatives are there? Strongly disagree. That's the entire point of these kinds of questions.
    - sirtaj 2y ago
      Without a counter-argument it just becomes a statement of faith, of the "it's so obvious that god exists that I don't have to prove it" variety. You're entitled to your opinion, but expecting others to take your word for its value isn't going to get you anywhere.
  - olalonde 2y ago
    What if we added some sort of additive to the sugary drinks that made people become fat and get tooth decay, wouldn't that dissuade them? (/s fwiw, I don't think there's a "solution", people should be free to mess with their health)
- netsharc 2y ago
  Oh no, taxes bad! Probably because we've all been programmed with the neoliberal agenda[1] of less money spent is better (for food, for cars, on taxes, like you've been programmed). Norway has had steep taxes for ICE cars for ages, and when EVs came along they were taxed very low, and to cite this source [2], 80% of new cars sold are now EV... [1] https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-... [2] https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/automotive-and-assembly/our-insights/what-norways-experience-reveals-about-the-ev-charging-market https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/automotive-and-assembly/...
  - _g6gm 2y ago
    [dead]
- YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
  In a country with taxpayer-funded healthcare, taxing things which make people unhealthy is just basic economics. The only problem with this tax is that it doesn’t go far enough. There’s definitely other product categories it could apply to.
  - sublinear 2y ago
    That's precisely why healthcare shouldn't be taxpayer funded. It's a total outage. There needs to be a separation of concerns, and do I really need to give a history lesson why taxing the disadvantaged is not a long term solution? History must repeat, but almost always from ignorance, huh?
    - robertjpayne 2y ago
      What?!? You argue disadvantaged shouldn’t be taxed but argue they should be on the hook for their own healthcare? Insanity.
    - lupusreal 2y ago
      > do I really need to Please do make your best argument for why taxing horribly unhealthy junk foods will actually harm poor people more than it helps. No sense holding back and merely threatening to make that argument. Do you figure that expensive cola will cause famine or something? I'm eager to know.
    - xen0 2y ago
      Ok, so who is paying for health care? Because it isn't the 'disadvantaged', many of whom are going to need it.
      - sublinear 2y ago
        I think there are more poor than you imagine. Can you provide solid numbers how this rectangle is constructed?
        2y ago
- knapcio 2y ago
  I'm close to being libertarian in many cases; however, I think that a tax may be a good way to quickly address this issue. I also believe that the money received from this tax should be directly spent on educating the public about why it's bad to consume too much sugar. The tax should be gradually decreased until people's habits change.
  - robertlagrant 2y ago
    > The tax should be gradually decreased until people's habits change I don't think people's habits will change irreversibly. If you remove the tax, a new cool drink (think Monster when it came out, but for kids) will sweep tiktok, and all the kids will want it. > the money received from this tax should be directly spent on educating the public about why it's bad to consume too much sugar Sadly I don't think taxes end up working this way for long. They might or might not start by doing this, but then they just stay forever.
    - knapcio 2y ago
      > I don't think people's habits will change irreversibly. I actually disagree. A great example is smoking. It's been declining for the past 70 years. It just became unattractive. > Sadly I don't think taxes end up working this way for long. They might or might not start by doing this, but then they just stay forever. I just described my idea how to approach this. I agree that governments are far from being perfect in this matter.
      - robertlagrant 2y ago
        Sorry - I'm missing the point being made?
- paulluuk 2y ago
  I doubt anyone is "blindly pursuing" this. There are many alternatives, but they all have their own downsides: 1. Prohibiting products that have sugar content above a certain percentage. 2. Asking the industry nicely to please favor children's health over profits. 3. Instead of taxing, giving subsidies to products that are "healthy alternatives". 4. Education campaigns telling children and parents to "say no to unhealthy food". I'm sure there's even more. I don't like taxing unhealthy products, because it creates this weird incentive for selling more of it for the tax gains. Also, products like soy milk are taxed while cow milk is untaxed, despite cow milk being much less healthy than soy milk. But given these four alternatives, I still think taxes are the best way to do it, although I'd love to hear better alternatives.
  - scotty79 2y ago
    > despite cow milk being much less healthy than soy milk How could that possibly be true? One is a fluid that exists in similar forms for millions of years in order to supply all growing mammal infants with all the nutrients they need ... and the other is just some plant matter from a random cheaply cultivable plant (by currently dominant species at current tech level) dispersed in water. Is soy milk healthier in a sense that no food is healthier than too much food for a person who has western diet?
    - paulluuk 2y ago
      Seals, Lions, Platypus, Dolphins, and Koalas are also mammals that produce milk for their infants. All of their milk is bad for humans. While cow milk is better for us then the milk of most animals, it's not human milk. So why would it be healthier than (essentially) water with some plants in it? Also, 70% of the human population is allergic to cow milk (as opposed to 0.4% being allergic to soy). Anyway, there's tons of data public about it that you can easily find, just wanted to respond to your "millions of years" argument.
      - scotty79 2y ago
        There's no reason to think that dolphin milk for example is bad for humans. It has just a bit more fat than lactose. In a balanced diet it could be perfectly fine. It's just inconvenient to acquire. Humanity milks basically any milk that is convenient to milk. And uses it as food since the beginning of animal domestication with amazing results. I doubt 70% of human population is allergic to milk. If you just read Wikipedia article about milk allergy you'll find out that the rate is 3% and 15% of those 3% are also allergic to soy. And that is just about children. Only 0.4% retain milk allergy in adulthood. I can imagine that 65% people don't have ability to digest lactose because they lost it at some point because of culture and food availability they didn't need to retain it beyond childhood. The funny thing is that the problem is with just lactose and if you supplement the missing enzyme nearly all people can draw nutritional benefit from milks vitamins, micro elements, sugars and fats. Could you point me to some research indicating superiority of soy milk over any animal milk, preferably one that's not analogous to "eating Teflon is healthier than eating a burger for the purposes of weight loss"?
- ollybee 2y ago
  Yes absolutely. It's not a tax aimed at consumers, or even raising revenue. It's to incentivize manufacturers to reformulate their drinks to be less harmful and seems to have worked. An alternative might be a straight ban on high sugar drinks which seems blunt and less fair response.
- 4ndrewl 2y ago
  How else might you persuade companies operating in a competitive marketplace to change the makeup of their products? Ask them nicely?
- Moldoteck 2y ago
  taxes are the most efficient instrument a govt can use. You decrease taxes for things you want to grow in consumption/use and you increase taxes for things you want to reduce production/consumption. Do you want faster transition to renewables and others from fossils? Increase taxes for fossil related stuff and decrease them for production & import of renewable related stuff. Same thing goes for electric cars, same things goes for electric/simple bikes. The only problem I see is low tax for artificial sweeteners. It would be nice to both limit the max quantity for sweeteners we know and limit the sweetness for all others to avoid high concentration of unknown stuff
- elefanten 2y ago
  You should take a breath and make your complete argument somewhere all at once. Your reactive fragmented answers up and down the tree of comments are still terminally unintelligible, as of this comment.
- rsynnott 2y ago
  There are, broadly, four routes to getting people to stop using dangerous consumer products: - Public education: This is easiest, but not particularly effective. Doctors, and more recently governments, have been telling people to eat less sugar for about a century; meanwhile, in most places, the level of sugar consumption has only increased. - Taxes/levies: This is thought to be somewhat effective (in particular it seems to have worked in many places for tobacco to some extent), and it has the great advantage that it's _easy to do_; governments typically have a lot of latitude over what they tax and it's quite difficult for the industry to resist through legal means (they can still lobby, of course). - Ban or restrict advertising: This seems to have been effective for tobacco and maybe alcohol, but certainly in Britain it's currently seen as a bit culture war-y (Sadiq Khan banned ads for unhealthy food on TfL, apparently with some promising results, but the right-wing media had a complete nervous breakdown) and is open to legal challenges. Some other countries, with different political environments, are in the process of doing this for certain problem food products. - Ban the product: This is practically impossible, even for products which are known to be extremely harmful like tobacco. Just a political death sentence, not worth pursuing. Given the above, they probably did about the best they could.
walthamstow 2y ago
People are still buying and drinking fizzy sweet drinks marketed by mega corps, its just that they've been reformulated to be something like 25/75 sugar/sweetener so they aren't subject to the tax. All popular drinks in the UK are formulated like this now, the exception being original coke.
- elthran 2y ago
  Yeah, it's definitely seems it's this from my perspective. The companies reformulated and reduced our full-sugar options, all so they didn't have to put their prices up, at the cost of the tastes of their products and consumer choices. And then the last few years hit and they massively up their prices anyway. I always happily pay extra for original coke, but so often with other brands I can no longer find the full sugar versions in stock
- Ekaros 2y ago
  Or it will destroy sales. One "store-brand" energy drink did this move and it destroyed the sales so badly they bought full-sugar version back. Still, it seems in general things are moving to this direction as only normal drink I see on fountains is now Coca-Cola...
- shalmanese 2y ago
  Isn't that exactly the point of the policy? Consumer habits don't have to change but their sugar consumption goes down because of economically rational incentives and they have to make an affirmative change in habits to go back to their previous levels of sugar consumption.
  - dzhiurgis 2y ago
    I don't think anyone knows what the policy is, other than virtue signalling. Personally I'd argue sugar is worse for adults (sedentary lifestyle, means to buy it) than kids (fast growth, little money).
hacker_88 2y ago
Here's what the impacted citizens have to say. https://youtu.be/5IP2Go7LHQA https://youtu.be/5IP2Go7LHQA
shzhdbi09gv8ioi 2y ago
Its not like the non-sugar sweeteners are any more healthy. https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/06/health/xylitol-heart-attack-stroke-wellness/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/06/health/xylitol-heart-atta...
- spacebanana7 2y ago
  Aspartame is the most studied chemical in history, and there has never been repeatable evidence of harm. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame_controversy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame_controversy
  - Rinzler89 2y ago
    But Aspartame tastes like ass to me. It leaves that nasty chemical aftertaste in your mouth. I have no idea how people can't taste the difference between sugar and aspartame.
    - jeroenhd 2y ago
      You're just unlucky. The taste issue is determined by genetics [1], although the grossest taste is often the result of sweeteners combined with aspartame, like Ace K. Sweetener mixes are made so that most people will not taste a gross aftertaste. Some people will experience a bitter aspartame taste, and others will experience a very chemical aftertaste for other sweeteners, but the majority of the market doesn't. [1]: https://academic.oup.com/chemse/article/38/5/379/360864 https://academic.oup.com/chemse/article/38/5/379/360864
      - Rinzler89 2y ago
        >You're just unlucky. Story of my life.
        Zdechlak 2y ago
        On the contrary, I think we are extremely lucky for not being able to stomach aspartame.
reedf1 2y ago
And consumption of erythritol, xylitol, and other sugar alcohols (maltitol, mannitol, sorbitol...) goes completely unmonitored. It's important to note that in most products sugar was simply replaced by sweetener - not reduced. Are we okay with this large scale natural experiment on children's health? There is building evidence of glucose tolerance, prothrombosis, and cardiovascular risk.
- frereubu 2y ago
  This is a good write-up on the emerging issues around some sweeteners: https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/and-now-xylitol https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/and-now-xylitol
  - pcthrowaway 2y ago
    Sabine Hossenfelder has a good video on sugar alcohols like erythritol and xylitol as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5v61YtDYo4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5v61YtDYo4
  - dtech 2y ago
    Isn't aspartame used 99% of the time in sodas? Despite decade-long doubts, afaik studies have always failed to find convincing evidence of it being problematic.
  - tuukkah 2y ago
    "First erythritol, now xylitol. This research group followed the same flawed design and ended up with the same flawed conclusions." https://peterattiamd.com/xylitol-and-cvd/ https://peterattiamd.com/xylitol-and-cvd/
- throwaway743950 2y ago
  Let's not pretend sweeteners are anywhere near as damaging as sugar.
  - bmacho 2y ago
    Humans eat sugars for thousands of years now (and honey since millions of years), but random sweeteners are new. I'd say let's not pretend that any map made by splashing paint on a paper is the terrain, and go full retard based on that.
Wolfenstein98k 2y ago
Correlation. The article notes sugar consumption was dropping for over a decade before the tax. It is also dropping over the same period in comparable non-tax countries. "Science journalism" is often a net-negative in terms of informing the public.
- elefanten 2y ago
  Was sugar consumption halving every year for over a decade? Whatever the mechanism (seemingly up for debate), a halving post-tax is an outsized change.
choffee 2y ago
I wonder how much of this was due to the tax and how much about it being in the news a lot at the time. The article seems to suggest this was just 2019 results I wonder how the trend has continued. Also if we have just moved people to sweetener then are we just going from one health issue to another? An interesting correlation none the less. It would also be interesting to see if the health of people had changed over time as well. If all we have done is remove some sugar from drinks and people are getting just as sick then it feels like an unnecessary pain point. I do feel that longer term education would be better, that and banning advertising of high sugar items as we did for tobacco. For instance all the bus stops near me are plastered in junk food and high sugar items which just make them feel normal. Bring back the veg marketing board!
- yungporko 2y ago
  i'm certain it's neither, what actually happened was basically all popular drinks in the entirety of the UK except for coca cola and pepsi (which cost more) just stopped selling non-diet versions of their drinks to avoid the tax, it's not that people are choosing to avoid sugar, they literally just can't buy it.
- rsynnott 2y ago
  > I do feel that longer term education would be better, that and banning advertising of high sugar items as we did for tobacco. For instance all the bus stops near me are plastered in junk food and high sugar items which just make them feel normal. Bring back the veg marketing board! Sadiq Khan did this for TfL, and there is some evidence that it has worked to some extent: https://evidence.nihr.ac.uk/alert/advertising-ban-was-linked-to-lower-purchases-of-unhealthy-food-and-drink/ https://evidence.nihr.ac.uk/alert/advertising-ban-was-linked... Of course, there was absolute _outrage_ (certainly entirely grassroots and not instigated by agribusiness, dear me no), so it would be politically sensitive to expand.
_g6gm 2y ago
Mainstream media pushing "more tax is actually good"? Well, I'm shocked sir.
- _cenw 2y ago
  Do you oppose tobacco tax - nicotine and tobacco smoke being considered almost universally bad - on the same grounds, or is sugar different?
  - desiredState 2y ago
    [flagged]
  - roenxi 2y ago
    That question is actually leaning towards quite a bad argument, similar to a slippery-slope. Everyone has a threshold somewhere dividing acceptable and other activities. Someone having different standards for different substances is irrelevant. It is similar in character to someone saying a sin tax on sugar is the same as a sin tax on meat. Both in consequence, evidence of harm and in public acceptability those things are clearly different. On this specific topic someone drinking sugar drinks is clearly less harmful than someone smoking, because sugar drinks have a strictly personal impact. desiredState having or not having a different standard for tobacco doesn't cast a shadow on his opinions on sugar taxes.
    - AntoniusBlock 2y ago
      > because sugar drinks have a strictly personal impact. Not in this case, as the UK's NHS is tax-payer funded.
      - roenxi 2y ago
        An individual could sit placidly in the sun gazing out on a field of flowers and arguably be causing taxpayers harm because they aren't exercising and otherwise bettering their physical health (or maybe the pollen is increasing their risk of an expensive lung cancer, who knows). There is more of an argument against taxpayer funds for the NHS than anything to do with sugar drinks in that observation. It is inescapably arbitrary what unhealthy behaviours are being subsidised vs. taxed.
standardUser 2y ago
The tax is at most $0.31 per sugary drink (18 or 24 pence depending on sugar content) and it only applies to beverages. Impressive if such a small and niche tax had that big of an impact. I imagine the raised awareness caused by passing the law did as much as the tax itself. I spent some time in Mexico and all of the packaged foods have a big warning if they're too sugar-heavy. It instantly changed my shopping habits because it made me question foods I had taken for granted. I'd argue that's a better use of government power than a tax. The former approach requires business to bend to the public will, while the latter manipulates the public at their own expense.
- rightbyte 2y ago
  It probably shifted consumption to artificially sweetened soda, right?
  - robertlagrant 2y ago
    It did three things: - cans of sugary drinks got smaller, to avoid the limit that was taxed, so some people bought cans with less sugar in - some people bought more artifically sweetened drinks - some people paid more for the same amount of sugar
    - Moldoteck 2y ago
      wait, so the limit/tax is not per percent mass of the final product but just overall quantity inside?
      - robertlagrant 2y ago
        Sorry - I got that wrong. They got smaller so the overall price would be the same, when the tax is included.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - standardUser 2y ago
mg 2y ago
Next: Carbon Tax
- ZeroGravitas 2y ago
  Pretty much the whole world already has carbon pricing. USA is the major outlier and they have it at the sub-federal level. The level will rise over time but it's already been effective in many domains, the UK phase out of coal for example. https://carbonpricingdashboard.worldbank.org/ https://carbonpricingdashboard.worldbank.org/
TrackerFF 2y ago
It's a lot of sugar. Imagine a kid drinks one small (0.33L) can of soda, every day, all year round. A regular Cola/Fanta/Sprite/etc. usually has around 10 grams of sugar, so 33 grams of sugar for every can. One gram of sugar is roughly equivalent to one gram of carbohydrates, which has 4 kcal of energy pr. gram. A small can comes to 132 kcal. Consuming that every day of the year, comes to around 48000 kcal of excess energy (12 kg of sugar!). One kg of bodyfat is roughly equivalent to 7700 kcal. If this kid lives a very sedentary lifestyle, so that every can that's consumed is excess calories, the worst case would be 5-6 kg of extra bodyfat in year. Luckily it is more complex than that, and the weight gain would likely be much less. But still, over the years a habit like that could easily lead to many kg of extra bodyfat. Now if you go for a lighter alternative, like those drinks that mix sugars and sweeteners, that could cut down sugar intake by half (to a quarter). Or diet soda, which is close to zero calories. The best would of course to teach your kid to exclusively drink water when they're thirsty, and keep the soda as a weekend treat. Bad habits die hard.
- blackoil 2y ago
  > The best would of course to teach your kid to exclusively drink water when they're thirsty, and keep the soda as a weekend treat. Best way is don't keep these drinks in school and at home. Don't buy in bulk. You buy at once max one can per person and consume it.
- Fire-Dragon-DoL 2y ago
  They can also drink milk when they are thirsty (which would make them feel full), if they want an alternative to water
teractiveodular 2y ago
Misleading headline: it's not total sugar consumption, but sugar from soft drinks that halved after the tax (on soft drinks). Per quick Googling, for adults soft drinks represent only 16% of sugar consumption, although I suspect the distribution of soft drinks consumption itself is quite uneven (as in, there are many adults who don't drink soft drinks, and many who drink nothing but).
- n4r9 2y ago
  I'd also expect that kids drink sugary soft drinks more than adults.
  - makingstuffs 2y ago
    I’d also presume that the consumption of sugar replacements has increased by an amount related that of sugar’s decline. In the UK you’re hard pressed to find any actual real sugar in soft drinks since the tax was imposed. Instead most things are packed to the gills with alternatives.
    - n4r9 2y ago
      What do you mean by "actual real sugar"? Do you mean a specific chemical like fructose or sucrose, the source of the sugar, or something else? Fanta, Sprite, Dr Pepper and Pepsi all reduced their sugar content to around half (~5g/100ml) following the sugar tax. Coca Cola still has it up at ~10g/100ml. They all still have sugar in their nutrional info. I'm not sure that the source of the sugar has changed, but I don't know what the source actually is. I know that in the US they tend to use high-fructose corn syrup because it's cheap, but that the EU restricts import of this. Would be interesting to see whether any changes have happened here as a consequence of Brexit.
  - imadierich 2y ago
    [dead]
ZeroGravitas 2y ago
The Boris Johnston government tried to hide a government report on the succes of this tax as, like many in this forum, his part of the party is heavily influenced by US corporate propaganda ( sometimes misleadingly called "libertarianism")and the success of popular taxes isn't politically correct for them.
t0bia_s 2y ago
Glorification (propaganda) of taxation or regulation looks reasonable. What about personal (patents) responsibility and information about consumption unhealthy food/drinks?
readthenotes1 2y ago
I've been saying for years that I will take health care as a serious name when they start reducing added sugars. I guess the UK has health care.
Sparyjerry 2y ago
I believe in sugar free soda as an alternative to regular soda, however the "experts" in this article are completely off base to say it is a no brainer to tax other sugary items. Sure, reduction of sugar intake -via soda- was reduced per the article, but sugar intake is not even the right measurement of success. The right measurement is health, were BMI, obesity, diabetes, heart problems, or overall mortality rate reduced. You can cut all the sugar you want but if you are consuming other carbohydrates or calories as a replacement, then you are doing all for naught. Not saying its true, but imagine someone whose hunger is satiated by consuming small amounts of sugar resulting in overall lower calorie intake. Again, sugar intake is a meaningless stat without the resulting health impact being taken into account.
462436347 2y ago
How much longer are you people going to keep beating this dead horse? Sugar consumption has been in secular decline since 2000: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38094768 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38094768 People are eating about as much sugar per capita now as they were in the early 70s, yet they're fatter and more diabetic than ever, even than when they were consuming significantly more sugar 24 years ago. A tax on added fats (oils, butter, lard) and excessive sodium makes much more sense, but good luck getting such a measure enacted given how effective the propaganda from Big Fat (the dairy and beef industries and people promoting high-fat diets like keto and Atkins) has been.

117 points by doener 2y ago

Is this how we want to do this? Taxes... really? We should strongly question why this is the most effective means rather than blindly pursuing that it works and digging ourselves a deeper hole.

xen0 2y ago
Would you prefer an outright ban?
- sublinear 2y ago
  No.
drekipus 2y ago
In absence of a big stick, yes! People aren't going to will themselves to personal responsibility
alias_neo 2y ago
Can't have those poor people having sugar in their diet, it's bad for them. Sugar is for the rich.
- spacebanana7 2y ago
  There’s actually a paradoxical situation in most developed countries where the poorer you are, the more likely you are to be overweight. Making unhealthy food too expensive for poor people is a blunt instrument of course, but it does have an empirical case. https://www.bmj.com/content/356/bmj.j163# https://www.bmj.com/content/356/bmj.j163#
  - rightbyte 2y ago
    Unhealthy food is allready way more expansive than cooking your own. I guess the main culprit is lack of energy and time to cook, not the price.
    - actionfromafar 2y ago
      Time is a kind of a price too. Also, look up "food desert" some time. It's real.
    - alias_neo 2y ago
      I disagree when it comes to the UK. Healthy food; fresh fruit, vegetables and meat is significantly more expensive than processed food. There are/were plenty of British YouTuber's doing "how cheap can you eat" meals through COVID and the cost of living crisis, they started at ~£1 for a bare-bones meal for one, they were at ~£1.50 last I looked; that's hopefully improving with the recent falls in inflation, but still and issue for many. Of course the same demographic who can't afford the ingredients to cook their own healthy meals can often also not afford the time to prepare them either; due to working long hours, not being able to afford care for their children, etc. Food banks are very much on the rise in many parts of the UK[0] and we have millions of children in poverty[1], a significant and heart breaking statistic for such a country. [0] https://www.trusselltrust.org/news-and-blog/latest-stats/end-year-stats/#factsheets https://www.trusselltrust.org/news-and-blog/latest-stats/end... [1] https://cpag.org.uk/child-poverty/poverty-facts-and-figures https://cpag.org.uk/child-poverty/poverty-facts-and-figures
  - alias_neo 2y ago
    I think everyone missed the sarcasm my comment was dripping with, British humour I guess. I'll take the downvotes. I understand the issues with sugar, I have no arguments with it, but it is, as you say, a blunt instrument. Sadly, the opposite case; healthy food, is also too expensive for the same demographic this affects; that's a separate and independent problem though, and the evidence in OP seems to suggest the tax is (somewhat) effective, so, again, no arguments from me. EDIT: To be clear, I'm talking about in the UK when I talk about a demographic.
petepete 2y ago
It works and it works quickly. What else would?
- sublinear 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - petepete 2y ago
    You answered it yourself. Parents don't know/care, their kids bare the brunt. Taxing isn't ideal and is a blunt instrument at best - but I'm not convinced there's a better (working) alternative.
    - ollybee 2y ago
      I don't think it is a blunt instrument, in fact I'd say the complete opposite. It's been a nudge of industry in a direction that's better for society, in a way that keeps that playing field level for different manufacturers, reduced their overall tax burden and not cost consumers anything. All this while avoiding any harsh ban, you can still buy high sugar drinks if you wish.
- GrassTheKayaks 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - sublinear 2y ago
    [flagged]
  - petepete 2y ago
    No sensible solutions then, par for the course!
  - YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
    Think about how you’d actually implement that policy. It’d be political suicide. I can see the ‘literally killing children’ headlines already. No law can change anything if it can’t make it through the Commons.
smoothbran 2y ago
If you're allergic to the word tax, then think of it more as a fee. If you want to sell a soda in the UK that is greater than X% sugar, you pay an additional, relatively small, fee. There are a lot of externalities from having an unhealthy populace, this fee can help to counter that.
- sublinear 2y ago
  Why in the hell would anyone need to pay a tax for this is my question. Sounds like a racket to me. What's next?
  - waciki 2y ago
    You're not replying to OP > There are a lot of externalities from having an unhealthy populace, this fee can help to counter that.
    - skatebear 2y ago
      Is this tax sized to cover for that externalities or the amount is decided in other basis (likely to maximize government revenue)? Is the collected money exclusively used to counter the externalities or is the spending left to the discretion of the government? I'm asking from ignorance, but if the answer of any of those questions is no then the purpose of the tax is not to make up for the externalities.
      - rsynnott 2y ago
        > Is this tax sized to cover for that externalities No, nothing like it. The final costs to the state of excessive sugar consumption are _vast_. This levy is primarily to discourage people from consuming loads of sugar. > Is the collected money exclusively used to counter the externalities While I don't know, I'd be very surprised. That sort of bucketed approach to tax collection/use is _extremely_ inefficient; the only place it can possibly be justified is social insurance.
  - xen0 2y ago
Skeime 2y ago
I think a tax or levy is somewhat reasonable, but then should go towards paying for sugar-induced costs (mostly healthcare, I'd assume).
Bancakes 2y ago
they’ve been putting made up dietary pyramids in schools for decades, and it hasn’t worked.
tene80i 2y ago
Who says it’s blindly pursuing anything, or indeed a hole of any depth? It works because it increases the price, which reduces demand and leads suppliers to change recipes. What is your concern?
CalRobert 2y ago
How else would you do it? Is it bad we tax cigarettes too? I’m open to the argument that it -is- bad, actually, but a tax seems like a reasonable approach if you want people to drink less sugar.
frereubu 2y ago
It's not good enough to just ask questions like that - what alternatives are there? The information that too much sugar is bad for you isn't exactly hidden away, yet rates of obesity, tooth decay and diabetes are still going up.
- sublinear 2y ago
  > It's not good enough to just ask questions like that - what alternatives are there? Strongly disagree. That's the entire point of these kinds of questions.
  - sirtaj 2y ago
    Without a counter-argument it just becomes a statement of faith, of the "it's so obvious that god exists that I don't have to prove it" variety. You're entitled to your opinion, but expecting others to take your word for its value isn't going to get you anywhere.
- olalonde 2y ago
  What if we added some sort of additive to the sugary drinks that made people become fat and get tooth decay, wouldn't that dissuade them? (/s fwiw, I don't think there's a "solution", people should be free to mess with their health)
netsharc 2y ago
Oh no, taxes bad! Probably because we've all been programmed with the neoliberal agenda[1] of less money spent is better (for food, for cars, on taxes, like you've been programmed). Norway has had steep taxes for ICE cars for ages, and when EVs came along they were taxed very low, and to cite this source [2], 80% of new cars sold are now EV... [1] https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-... [2] https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/automotive-and-assembly/our-insights/what-norways-experience-reveals-about-the-ev-charging-market https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/automotive-and-assembly/...
- _g6gm 2y ago
  [dead]
YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
In a country with taxpayer-funded healthcare, taxing things which make people unhealthy is just basic economics. The only problem with this tax is that it doesn’t go far enough. There’s definitely other product categories it could apply to.
- sublinear 2y ago
  That's precisely why healthcare shouldn't be taxpayer funded. It's a total outage. There needs to be a separation of concerns, and do I really need to give a history lesson why taxing the disadvantaged is not a long term solution? History must repeat, but almost always from ignorance, huh?
  - robertjpayne 2y ago
    What?!? You argue disadvantaged shouldn’t be taxed but argue they should be on the hook for their own healthcare? Insanity.
  - lupusreal 2y ago
    > do I really need to Please do make your best argument for why taxing horribly unhealthy junk foods will actually harm poor people more than it helps. No sense holding back and merely threatening to make that argument. Do you figure that expensive cola will cause famine or something? I'm eager to know.
  - xen0 2y ago
    Ok, so who is paying for health care? Because it isn't the 'disadvantaged', many of whom are going to need it.
    - sublinear 2y ago
      I think there are more poor than you imagine. Can you provide solid numbers how this rectangle is constructed?
      - 2y ago
knapcio 2y ago
I'm close to being libertarian in many cases; however, I think that a tax may be a good way to quickly address this issue. I also believe that the money received from this tax should be directly spent on educating the public about why it's bad to consume too much sugar. The tax should be gradually decreased until people's habits change.
- robertlagrant 2y ago
  > The tax should be gradually decreased until people's habits change I don't think people's habits will change irreversibly. If you remove the tax, a new cool drink (think Monster when it came out, but for kids) will sweep tiktok, and all the kids will want it. > the money received from this tax should be directly spent on educating the public about why it's bad to consume too much sugar Sadly I don't think taxes end up working this way for long. They might or might not start by doing this, but then they just stay forever.
  - knapcio 2y ago
    > I don't think people's habits will change irreversibly. I actually disagree. A great example is smoking. It's been declining for the past 70 years. It just became unattractive. > Sadly I don't think taxes end up working this way for long. They might or might not start by doing this, but then they just stay forever. I just described my idea how to approach this. I agree that governments are far from being perfect in this matter.
    - robertlagrant 2y ago
      Sorry - I'm missing the point being made?
paulluuk 2y ago
I doubt anyone is "blindly pursuing" this. There are many alternatives, but they all have their own downsides: 1. Prohibiting products that have sugar content above a certain percentage. 2. Asking the industry nicely to please favor children's health over profits. 3. Instead of taxing, giving subsidies to products that are "healthy alternatives". 4. Education campaigns telling children and parents to "say no to unhealthy food". I'm sure there's even more. I don't like taxing unhealthy products, because it creates this weird incentive for selling more of it for the tax gains. Also, products like soy milk are taxed while cow milk is untaxed, despite cow milk being much less healthy than soy milk. But given these four alternatives, I still think taxes are the best way to do it, although I'd love to hear better alternatives.
- scotty79 2y ago
  > despite cow milk being much less healthy than soy milk How could that possibly be true? One is a fluid that exists in similar forms for millions of years in order to supply all growing mammal infants with all the nutrients they need ... and the other is just some plant matter from a random cheaply cultivable plant (by currently dominant species at current tech level) dispersed in water. Is soy milk healthier in a sense that no food is healthier than too much food for a person who has western diet?
  - paulluuk 2y ago
    Seals, Lions, Platypus, Dolphins, and Koalas are also mammals that produce milk for their infants. All of their milk is bad for humans. While cow milk is better for us then the milk of most animals, it's not human milk. So why would it be healthier than (essentially) water with some plants in it? Also, 70% of the human population is allergic to cow milk (as opposed to 0.4% being allergic to soy). Anyway, there's tons of data public about it that you can easily find, just wanted to respond to your "millions of years" argument.
    - scotty79 2y ago
      There's no reason to think that dolphin milk for example is bad for humans. It has just a bit more fat than lactose. In a balanced diet it could be perfectly fine. It's just inconvenient to acquire. Humanity milks basically any milk that is convenient to milk. And uses it as food since the beginning of animal domestication with amazing results. I doubt 70% of human population is allergic to milk. If you just read Wikipedia article about milk allergy you'll find out that the rate is 3% and 15% of those 3% are also allergic to soy. And that is just about children. Only 0.4% retain milk allergy in adulthood. I can imagine that 65% people don't have ability to digest lactose because they lost it at some point because of culture and food availability they didn't need to retain it beyond childhood. The funny thing is that the problem is with just lactose and if you supplement the missing enzyme nearly all people can draw nutritional benefit from milks vitamins, micro elements, sugars and fats. Could you point me to some research indicating superiority of soy milk over any animal milk, preferably one that's not analogous to "eating Teflon is healthier than eating a burger for the purposes of weight loss"?
ollybee 2y ago
Yes absolutely. It's not a tax aimed at consumers, or even raising revenue. It's to incentivize manufacturers to reformulate their drinks to be less harmful and seems to have worked. An alternative might be a straight ban on high sugar drinks which seems blunt and less fair response.
4ndrewl 2y ago
How else might you persuade companies operating in a competitive marketplace to change the makeup of their products? Ask them nicely?
Moldoteck 2y ago
taxes are the most efficient instrument a govt can use. You decrease taxes for things you want to grow in consumption/use and you increase taxes for things you want to reduce production/consumption. Do you want faster transition to renewables and others from fossils? Increase taxes for fossil related stuff and decrease them for production & import of renewable related stuff. Same thing goes for electric cars, same things goes for electric/simple bikes. The only problem I see is low tax for artificial sweeteners. It would be nice to both limit the max quantity for sweeteners we know and limit the sweetness for all others to avoid high concentration of unknown stuff
elefanten 2y ago
You should take a breath and make your complete argument somewhere all at once. Your reactive fragmented answers up and down the tree of comments are still terminally unintelligible, as of this comment.
rsynnott 2y ago
There are, broadly, four routes to getting people to stop using dangerous consumer products: - Public education: This is easiest, but not particularly effective. Doctors, and more recently governments, have been telling people to eat less sugar for about a century; meanwhile, in most places, the level of sugar consumption has only increased. - Taxes/levies: This is thought to be somewhat effective (in particular it seems to have worked in many places for tobacco to some extent), and it has the great advantage that it's _easy to do_; governments typically have a lot of latitude over what they tax and it's quite difficult for the industry to resist through legal means (they can still lobby, of course). - Ban or restrict advertising: This seems to have been effective for tobacco and maybe alcohol, but certainly in Britain it's currently seen as a bit culture war-y (Sadiq Khan banned ads for unhealthy food on TfL, apparently with some promising results, but the right-wing media had a complete nervous breakdown) and is open to legal challenges. Some other countries, with different political environments, are in the process of doing this for certain problem food products. - Ban the product: This is practically impossible, even for products which are known to be extremely harmful like tobacco. Just a political death sentence, not worth pursuing. Given the above, they probably did about the best they could.

walthamstow 2y ago

People are still buying and drinking fizzy sweet drinks marketed by mega corps, its just that they've been reformulated to be something like 25/75 sugar/sweetener so they aren't subject to the tax. All popular drinks in the UK are formulated like this now, the exception being original coke.

elthran 2y ago
Yeah, it's definitely seems it's this from my perspective. The companies reformulated and reduced our full-sugar options, all so they didn't have to put their prices up, at the cost of the tastes of their products and consumer choices. And then the last few years hit and they massively up their prices anyway. I always happily pay extra for original coke, but so often with other brands I can no longer find the full sugar versions in stock
Ekaros 2y ago
Or it will destroy sales. One "store-brand" energy drink did this move and it destroyed the sales so badly they bought full-sugar version back. Still, it seems in general things are moving to this direction as only normal drink I see on fountains is now Coca-Cola...
shalmanese 2y ago
Isn't that exactly the point of the policy? Consumer habits don't have to change but their sugar consumption goes down because of economically rational incentives and they have to make an affirmative change in habits to go back to their previous levels of sugar consumption.
- dzhiurgis 2y ago
  I don't think anyone knows what the policy is, other than virtue signalling. Personally I'd argue sugar is worse for adults (sedentary lifestyle, means to buy it) than kids (fast growth, little money).

hacker_88 2y ago

Here's what the impacted citizens have to say. https://youtu.be/5IP2Go7LHQA https://youtu.be/5IP2Go7LHQA

shzhdbi09gv8ioi 2y ago

Its not like the non-sugar sweeteners are any more healthy. https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/06/health/xylitol-heart-attack-stroke-wellness/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/06/health/xylitol-heart-atta...

spacebanana7 2y ago
Aspartame is the most studied chemical in history, and there has never been repeatable evidence of harm. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame_controversy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame_controversy
- Rinzler89 2y ago
  But Aspartame tastes like ass to me. It leaves that nasty chemical aftertaste in your mouth. I have no idea how people can't taste the difference between sugar and aspartame.
  - jeroenhd 2y ago
    You're just unlucky. The taste issue is determined by genetics [1], although the grossest taste is often the result of sweeteners combined with aspartame, like Ace K. Sweetener mixes are made so that most people will not taste a gross aftertaste. Some people will experience a bitter aspartame taste, and others will experience a very chemical aftertaste for other sweeteners, but the majority of the market doesn't. [1]: https://academic.oup.com/chemse/article/38/5/379/360864 https://academic.oup.com/chemse/article/38/5/379/360864
    - Rinzler89 2y ago
      >You're just unlucky. Story of my life.
      - Zdechlak 2y ago
        On the contrary, I think we are extremely lucky for not being able to stomach aspartame.

reedf1 2y ago

And consumption of erythritol, xylitol, and other sugar alcohols (maltitol, mannitol, sorbitol...) goes completely unmonitored. It's important to note that in most products sugar was simply replaced by sweetener - not reduced. Are we okay with this large scale natural experiment on children's health? There is building evidence of glucose tolerance, prothrombosis, and cardiovascular risk.

frereubu 2y ago
This is a good write-up on the emerging issues around some sweeteners: https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/and-now-xylitol https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/and-now-xylitol
- pcthrowaway 2y ago
  Sabine Hossenfelder has a good video on sugar alcohols like erythritol and xylitol as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5v61YtDYo4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5v61YtDYo4
- dtech 2y ago
  Isn't aspartame used 99% of the time in sodas? Despite decade-long doubts, afaik studies have always failed to find convincing evidence of it being problematic.
- tuukkah 2y ago
  "First erythritol, now xylitol. This research group followed the same flawed design and ended up with the same flawed conclusions." https://peterattiamd.com/xylitol-and-cvd/ https://peterattiamd.com/xylitol-and-cvd/
throwaway743950 2y ago
Let's not pretend sweeteners are anywhere near as damaging as sugar.
- bmacho 2y ago
  Humans eat sugars for thousands of years now (and honey since millions of years), but random sweeteners are new. I'd say let's not pretend that any map made by splashing paint on a paper is the terrain, and go full retard based on that.

Wolfenstein98k 2y ago

Correlation. The article notes sugar consumption was dropping for over a decade before the tax. It is also dropping over the same period in comparable non-tax countries. "Science journalism" is often a net-negative in terms of informing the public.

elefanten 2y ago
Was sugar consumption halving every year for over a decade? Whatever the mechanism (seemingly up for debate), a halving post-tax is an outsized change.

choffee 2y ago

I wonder how much of this was due to the tax and how much about it being in the news a lot at the time. The article seems to suggest this was just 2019 results I wonder how the trend has continued. Also if we have just moved people to sweetener then are we just going from one health issue to another? An interesting correlation none the less. It would also be interesting to see if the health of people had changed over time as well. If all we have done is remove some sugar from drinks and people are getting just as sick then it feels like an unnecessary pain point. I do feel that longer term education would be better, that and banning advertising of high sugar items as we did for tobacco. For instance all the bus stops near me are plastered in junk food and high sugar items which just make them feel normal. Bring back the veg marketing board!

yungporko 2y ago
i'm certain it's neither, what actually happened was basically all popular drinks in the entirety of the UK except for coca cola and pepsi (which cost more) just stopped selling non-diet versions of their drinks to avoid the tax, it's not that people are choosing to avoid sugar, they literally just can't buy it.
rsynnott 2y ago
> I do feel that longer term education would be better, that and banning advertising of high sugar items as we did for tobacco. For instance all the bus stops near me are plastered in junk food and high sugar items which just make them feel normal. Bring back the veg marketing board! Sadiq Khan did this for TfL, and there is some evidence that it has worked to some extent: https://evidence.nihr.ac.uk/alert/advertising-ban-was-linked-to-lower-purchases-of-unhealthy-food-and-drink/ https://evidence.nihr.ac.uk/alert/advertising-ban-was-linked... Of course, there was absolute _outrage_ (certainly entirely grassroots and not instigated by agribusiness, dear me no), so it would be politically sensitive to expand.

_g6gm 2y ago

Mainstream media pushing "more tax is actually good"? Well, I'm shocked sir.

_cenw 2y ago
Do you oppose tobacco tax - nicotine and tobacco smoke being considered almost universally bad - on the same grounds, or is sugar different?
- desiredState 2y ago
  [flagged]
- roenxi 2y ago
  That question is actually leaning towards quite a bad argument, similar to a slippery-slope. Everyone has a threshold somewhere dividing acceptable and other activities. Someone having different standards for different substances is irrelevant. It is similar in character to someone saying a sin tax on sugar is the same as a sin tax on meat. Both in consequence, evidence of harm and in public acceptability those things are clearly different. On this specific topic someone drinking sugar drinks is clearly less harmful than someone smoking, because sugar drinks have a strictly personal impact. desiredState having or not having a different standard for tobacco doesn't cast a shadow on his opinions on sugar taxes.
  - AntoniusBlock 2y ago
    > because sugar drinks have a strictly personal impact. Not in this case, as the UK's NHS is tax-payer funded.
    - roenxi 2y ago
      An individual could sit placidly in the sun gazing out on a field of flowers and arguably be causing taxpayers harm because they aren't exercising and otherwise bettering their physical health (or maybe the pollen is increasing their risk of an expensive lung cancer, who knows). There is more of an argument against taxpayer funds for the NHS than anything to do with sugar drinks in that observation. It is inescapably arbitrary what unhealthy behaviours are being subsidised vs. taxed.

standardUser 2y ago

The tax is at most $0.31 per sugary drink (18 or 24 pence depending on sugar content) and it only applies to beverages. Impressive if such a small and niche tax had that big of an impact. I imagine the raised awareness caused by passing the law did as much as the tax itself. I spent some time in Mexico and all of the packaged foods have a big warning if they're too sugar-heavy. It instantly changed my shopping habits because it made me question foods I had taken for granted. I'd argue that's a better use of government power than a tax. The former approach requires business to bend to the public will, while the latter manipulates the public at their own expense.

rightbyte 2y ago
It probably shifted consumption to artificially sweetened soda, right?
- robertlagrant 2y ago
  It did three things: - cans of sugary drinks got smaller, to avoid the limit that was taxed, so some people bought cans with less sugar in - some people bought more artifically sweetened drinks - some people paid more for the same amount of sugar
  - Moldoteck 2y ago
    wait, so the limit/tax is not per percent mass of the final product but just overall quantity inside?
    - robertlagrant 2y ago
      Sorry - I got that wrong. They got smaller so the overall price would be the same, when the tax is included.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- standardUser 2y ago

mg 2y ago

Next: Carbon Tax

ZeroGravitas 2y ago
Pretty much the whole world already has carbon pricing. USA is the major outlier and they have it at the sub-federal level. The level will rise over time but it's already been effective in many domains, the UK phase out of coal for example. https://carbonpricingdashboard.worldbank.org/ https://carbonpricingdashboard.worldbank.org/

TrackerFF 2y ago

It's a lot of sugar. Imagine a kid drinks one small (0.33L) can of soda, every day, all year round. A regular Cola/Fanta/Sprite/etc. usually has around 10 grams of sugar, so 33 grams of sugar for every can. One gram of sugar is roughly equivalent to one gram of carbohydrates, which has 4 kcal of energy pr. gram. A small can comes to 132 kcal. Consuming that every day of the year, comes to around 48000 kcal of excess energy (12 kg of sugar!). One kg of bodyfat is roughly equivalent to 7700 kcal. If this kid lives a very sedentary lifestyle, so that every can that's consumed is excess calories, the worst case would be 5-6 kg of extra bodyfat in year. Luckily it is more complex than that, and the weight gain would likely be much less. But still, over the years a habit like that could easily lead to many kg of extra bodyfat. Now if you go for a lighter alternative, like those drinks that mix sugars and sweeteners, that could cut down sugar intake by half (to a quarter). Or diet soda, which is close to zero calories. The best would of course to teach your kid to exclusively drink water when they're thirsty, and keep the soda as a weekend treat. Bad habits die hard.

blackoil 2y ago
> The best would of course to teach your kid to exclusively drink water when they're thirsty, and keep the soda as a weekend treat. Best way is don't keep these drinks in school and at home. Don't buy in bulk. You buy at once max one can per person and consume it.
Fire-Dragon-DoL 2y ago
They can also drink milk when they are thirsty (which would make them feel full), if they want an alternative to water

teractiveodular 2y ago

Misleading headline: it's not total sugar consumption, but sugar from soft drinks that halved after the tax (on soft drinks). Per quick Googling, for adults soft drinks represent only 16% of sugar consumption, although I suspect the distribution of soft drinks consumption itself is quite uneven (as in, there are many adults who don't drink soft drinks, and many who drink nothing but).

n4r9 2y ago
I'd also expect that kids drink sugary soft drinks more than adults.
- makingstuffs 2y ago
  I’d also presume that the consumption of sugar replacements has increased by an amount related that of sugar’s decline. In the UK you’re hard pressed to find any actual real sugar in soft drinks since the tax was imposed. Instead most things are packed to the gills with alternatives.
  - n4r9 2y ago
    What do you mean by "actual real sugar"? Do you mean a specific chemical like fructose or sucrose, the source of the sugar, or something else? Fanta, Sprite, Dr Pepper and Pepsi all reduced their sugar content to around half (~5g/100ml) following the sugar tax. Coca Cola still has it up at ~10g/100ml. They all still have sugar in their nutrional info. I'm not sure that the source of the sugar has changed, but I don't know what the source actually is. I know that in the US they tend to use high-fructose corn syrup because it's cheap, but that the EU restricts import of this. Would be interesting to see whether any changes have happened here as a consequence of Brexit.
- imadierich 2y ago
  [dead]

ZeroGravitas 2y ago

The Boris Johnston government tried to hide a government report on the succes of this tax as, like many in this forum, his part of the party is heavily influenced by US corporate propaganda ( sometimes misleadingly called "libertarianism")and the success of popular taxes isn't politically correct for them.

t0bia_s 2y ago

Glorification (propaganda) of taxation or regulation looks reasonable. What about personal (patents) responsibility and information about consumption unhealthy food/drinks?

readthenotes1 2y ago

I've been saying for years that I will take health care as a serious name when they start reducing added sugars. I guess the UK has health care.

Sparyjerry 2y ago

I believe in sugar free soda as an alternative to regular soda, however the "experts" in this article are completely off base to say it is a no brainer to tax other sugary items. Sure, reduction of sugar intake -via soda- was reduced per the article, but sugar intake is not even the right measurement of success. The right measurement is health, were BMI, obesity, diabetes, heart problems, or overall mortality rate reduced. You can cut all the sugar you want but if you are consuming other carbohydrates or calories as a replacement, then you are doing all for naught. Not saying its true, but imagine someone whose hunger is satiated by consuming small amounts of sugar resulting in overall lower calorie intake. Again, sugar intake is a meaningless stat without the resulting health impact being taken into account.

462436347 2y ago

How much longer are you people going to keep beating this dead horse? Sugar consumption has been in secular decline since 2000: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38094768 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38094768 People are eating about as much sugar per capita now as they were in the early 70s, yet they're fatter and more diabetic than ever, even than when they were consuming significantly more sugar 24 years ago. A tax on added fats (oils, butter, lard) and excessive sodium makes much more sense, but good luck getting such a measure enacted given how effective the propaganda from Big Fat (the dairy and beef industries and people promoting high-fat diets like keto and Atkins) has been.