Comment & Debate
Sally Greenberg, “Making the case for a soda tax,” National Consumers League, June 2014: “NCL supports a tax on sweetened drinks, with proceeds devoted to school nutritional education programs. The latest research from the Robert Wood Johnson is that a calorie –based tax on drinks would reduce consumption of beverage calories. Based on sales data from supermarkets in New York, a .04 cent per calorie tax on sugar sweetened beverages would reduce the consumption of beverage calories by 9.3 percent. Research shows that a variety of pricing strategies can create incentives for healthier choices. Interestingly, a 20 percent increase in the cost of sweetened beverages, is estimated to reduce consumption by 24 percent. Like cigarettes, soda is price sensitive; raising the price of these empty calorie drinks may be just what we need to lower consumption levels.”