Taxing obesity

A bad idea. (Here is a good one.)

The rising rate of obesity is a complex phenomenon, touching on issues of culture, economics and biology. Quickie solutions such as imposing big taxes on sugary food are not likely to do much.

Yet public health advocates feel compelled to do something. Right now, their No. 1 villain seems to be soft drinks. A panel of University of Toronto researchers, in a report sponsored by the Heart and Stroke Foundation, has argued that "adult weight is modestly responsive to soft-drink taxes." In the U.S., meanwhile, President Barack Obama has said he, too, thinks a soda tax is worth exploring. Indeed, many American states have imposed such a tax. Proponents say that the consequences of obesity, as measured in individual health outcomes and also the larger burden imposed on the health-care system, justifies the tax.

Not everyone agrees. A recent Rand Corporation study of 7,300 school children found that small taxes on soda pop "do not substantially affect overall levels of soda consumption or obesity rates," according to Health Affairs. A 2007 study, "Can Soft Drink Taxes Reduce Population Weight?," suggests soda taxes would need to be as large as those on cigarettes to have any significant impact, but even then they "will not halt the obesity epidemic."

The Toronto researchers point to the success of tobacco taxes in discouraging smoking to argue that soft-drink taxes might do the same thing. This is a questionable analogy. The decline in smoking is due in large measure to the "denormalizing" of smoking -- in other words, education campaigns and other measures that have affixed a large social stigma to cigarettes.

Obesity is not just about what we eat and drink but about what do -- or, rather, don't do, namely, exercise our bodies. We lead sedentary lifestyles, thanks to a leisure-filled society. Television, the web, video games; all our electronic diversions have rendered us virtually immobile.

You don't cure a culture of sloth with the heavy hand of government. Not only does lifestyle taxation smack of state intrusiveness, but it can also be regressive.

A 2009 report from the Washington-based National Center for Policy Analysis points out that sin taxes impose a greater burden on poor people who tend to consume cheaper, less healthy food than do those in higher income brackets. Such taxes also "fail to produce the full extent of desired behavioural changes" -- less obesity -- because the demand for these products is inelastic. "A 27.5 per cent tax on a 50-cent can of soda would only lower the number of the obese and overweight from 66 per cent to 65.3 per cent," says the report, entitled "Not-So-Sweet Excise Taxes." [link added]

Clearly, we have a clash of evidence. That alone warrants hesitation in imposing a soda tax. Besides, if any government seriously considered lifestyle taxation, why stop at soft drinks? How about an obesity tax on hamburgers, Sony PlayStations and cable TV subscriptions?

Yep.