Fat tax: Mike Rayner on unhealthy foods

A friend posted this on Facebook saying he supported this 100%. He’s not really someone who I would want to get into a discussion about it, much less on Facebook, but I had some (pretty unclear) thoughts and wanted to see how anyone else felt about this…

Article in question: “A fat tax could raise money and help get people eating more healthily, says a director at the University of Oxford.”

I don’t think we have anything like this in the states (correct me if I’m wrong, please). It seems like government being very involved in the lives of its people. Now I know some countries, and some places of business here in the states, have a reimbursement-type program for people who choose to go to the gym or quit smoking or other good decisions about their lifestyle. I can understand wanting to help people to choose better for themselves, but wouldn’t education be a better option than taxing food items that are unhealthy? If money is an issue to discourage it, why not make all gyms free? Or hand out exercise equipment? None of that would solve the problem either way if it’s all about personal choices that people make in their daily lives about their health. Plus, for some people who do generally eat healthy, that can already be more expensive so how fair is it to make occassional junk food buys cost more because of a general obesity problem?

My thoughts aren’t very clear and I think what I’m trying to say is that it seems silly for junk food tax to be a solution to personal health decisions. Mostly I wonder how people feel about it.

Obesity has many factor including food but not exclusive or even solely. A tax on unhealthy foods is simply another idea from the lifestyle police trying to get you to comply with their standards. It will not solve the issue in the least

It’s an interesting idea, that I don’t 100% disagree with. It would be a pretty minor thing as far as overall public health. In the States where we are having a lack of funding on pretty much every level it might help some. Maybe I just like it for the same reason I don’t mind a heavy tax on cigarettes; I don’t buy them.

That’s what I’m thinking, you just had better words!

I can’t honestly believe that taxes collected from unhealthy foods would go toward something productive. The sad thing about money spending that I’ve noticed is that there’s enough money, it’s just not being used for the most appropriate or best things, which is sad.