This is topic How to cure obesity... in forum Officers' Lounge at Flare Sci-Fi Forums.


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Posted by Sean (Member # 2010) on :
 
That's it, governor...just make people pay more for things that make them fat. This is only slightly more surprising than the Cow fart tax that's circulating through the state legislature. I knew we were strapped for money...but damn! Taxing pop and cow farts? C'mon now.
 

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Posted by Fabrux (Member # 71) on :
 
They should tax any and all fast food restaurants as well. And not just the big chain places. Those little greaseholes in city centers, now that's some fatty food. Damned tasty, though.
 

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Posted by Sean (Member # 2010) on :
 
I believe the tax is applied to items you buy in a store, more than restaurant food. They suggest a $.15 tax on pop. That pretty much nullifies the recycle value. When I first heard about this, I thought, " What? They're going to tax fat people?" Then I read into it. As long as the cow fart tax doesn't get passed, I'm okay with it. It would drive the cost of beef up tremendously, and milk products. Which would probably only screw with the economy more...
 

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Posted by Pensive's Wetness (Member # 1203) on :
 
sounds like something PETA would pull. where and who is promting this legislation?
 

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Posted by Mars Needs Women (Member # 1505) on :
 
I live in New York, and this has epic fail written all over it. Especially since many people unfortunately don't have the money to buy healthy foods and drinks all the time.
 

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Posted by Sean (Member # 2010) on :
 
I hope it does. But, a part of me is pissed off that one of the first things to get cut is education...as opposed to other, seemingly more "useless" expenditures. The state helped the town fund a multi million dollar project to turn a bunch of intersections into roundabouts. Which are completely useless. They screw with traffic more than the traffic lights did. Worse, the have decided to decorate these roundabouts with hideous statues...each of which is at least $750K...waste of money.

Instead of cutting things like that, the state cuts school funding, which causes the already in the shit school districts to cut things that they never have had to cut before. All field trips in my district have been canceled for the year, and the ones that are approved cost a lot more than they used to, because we have to pay for the buses now, instead of the school. And, if the district has to cut departments, music will be the first to be pruned, or at least cut back. Never mind the fact that we have the best music education program in the area, or that 3 of my high school's performing groups are revered around the state, if not the whole east coast, not to mention Japan, and Germany...no, the football team needs to have those lights so they can play night games. We have to buy our own music for our guest artist concert with Dr. Andre Thomas in May. He's picked out 12 pieces for us to sing, so at $2 per copy...times at least 88 copies...times 12 pieces...that's over $2,000 that we will have to come up with.

That's what frustrates me the most about this economy. Well, not necessarily the economy, because that will bounce back up eventually. It's more NYS's stupidity that really gets to me though.
 

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Posted by The Ginger Beacon (Member # 1585) on :
 
Hey, hey, hey! Don't knock the roundabouts! Roundabouts are good. Like bananas. Which is what we should give fat kids, as well as other fruit!

This reminds me of the story of trh grasshopper and the octopus. Is any of this getting through to you?
 

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Posted by Fabrux (Member # 71) on :
 
Roundabouts are a very misunderstood traffic control device.
 

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Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
 
Both Civics and History are not considered vital to the FCAT test and are being dropped in Florida.

Also consider Jeb Bush's little scamola- having Lottery funds go to public schools (34 million a year) and then reducing the school's budget by the same amount (with money going to no where anyone can trace).
Add in that Florida leads the nation in cost-of-living increases and you get a net loss in public school funding of over 4 million a year.

This is the guy the RNC wants to run for Senate in two years.

Maybe, instead of taxing fatty foods they should, oh I dont know, teach healthy eating in schools, emphansize cardio vascular excersize in P.E. instead of useless team sports and promote weight loss in overweight children (and adults) as something to be admired instead of making fat people socially isolated.

Or....take cities with good excersize habits and use them as a model for cities with high percentages of overweight people- publicly available bikes, bike lanes on roads, organized walks, etc.
Instead you have various eating festivals.
 

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Posted by Sean (Member # 2010) on :
 
True, Buffalo has two of three of those a year...

What they seem to misunderstand, is that by taxing fatty foods and soda, it's highly unlikely that you're going to encourage people to make healthier choices. Instead, they're going to buy the same amount of the stuff that they did before, only now, it costs more, so they're going to have to make cuts in other places, like their health insurance, or other services. The cost of living ( well, eating at least) would go up. Alternatively, you have people who switch to the tax free diet-soda, which in the long run is actually worse for you because of all the chemical sweeteners in it. And, people will chug the stuff just like they do the full calorie drinks.

With this and his tax on cigarettes sold on the Indian reservations to non native Americans, I think Patterson has a very slim chance of re-election, if he decides to run. I mean, the man has tried, granted, but he could handle this a lot better. Many of these taxes ( the obesity tax especially) will be hard to enforce, because there are a lot of juices that have the same, or more sugar than pop, which aren't going to be taxed. If they want to tax the company for producing the beverages, that's one thing, but taxing the citizens for choosing sugar filled product A over chemical sweetener filled product B just doesn't seem to jive with many people.
 

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Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
 
The who "taxing indian" bit is allright with me- native americans both suffer and profit from the suffering of others- tax free!
Kinda a dark compensation package for the decendands of the original occupants of this country.
 

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Posted by B.J. (Member # 858) on :
 
It's not just cokes that he's planning on taxing. He also wants to severely increase the taxes on music downloads, gas, taxi rides, cable and satellite TV service, cigars, beer, movie and sports tickets, haircuts, and health spa visits, to name a few items.

quote:

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The most notable new tax is an 18 percent levy on sugary soft drinks. But many other existing taxes would increase. The tax on car rentals would rise to 6 percent from 5 percent. Taxes on beer and wine would more than double. Taxes on gasoline, cable and satellite TV service, cigars and flavored malt beverages would also go up. And the cost of owning and operating a car would rise significantly, with 16 fee increases.

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