The deficit

[Partha]

In a past life, I managed a convenience store, Dd. Believe me when I say that it's not as simple as you propose.

Go again to the healthy section of your local grocery store. Yes, prices are getting better, but they're not anywhere near low enough to compete with prepriced 99 cent chips and 99 cent two liters of unhealthy pop. How much does that tax need to be to make that adjustment worthwhile to the type of people I'm talking about? Huge. What healthy choices can you suggest for a convenience store that competes with 2/$1 snack cakes and 2/$1 bags of candy, while maintaining decent profit margins?

Further, you may induce stores to actually drop out of the welfare programs if they can't maintain a decent profit level. Then you take even more choices out of the hands of the poorest as the mom-and-pops and the convenience stores refuse to take EBT cards.

[Embar Angylwrath]

@Partha - What would the people do if all the convenince stores and fast food places disappeared? Would they die? Or would they find a way to the grocery store?

[Ddrak]

In a past life, I managed a convenience store, Dd. Believe me when I say that it's not as simple as you propose.

Go again to the healthy section of your local grocery store. Yes, prices are getting better, but they're not anywhere near low enough to compete with prepriced 99 cent chips and 99 cent two liters of unhealthy pop. How much does that tax need to be to make that adjustment worthwhile to the type of people I'm talking about? Huge. What healthy choices can you suggest for a convenience store that competes with 2/$1 snack cakes and 2/$1 bags of candy, while maintaining decent profit margins?

Further, you may induce stores to actually drop out of the welfare programs if they can't maintain a decent profit level. Then you take even more choices out of the hands of the poorest as the mom-and-pops and the convenience stores refuse to take EBT cards.

I'm wondering what the difference here and there is, to be honest. Even gas stations are starting to sell basic foods (flour, milk, fruit/veg) over here, though I will admit that the fruit/veg range is fairly limited. Sure, they still have their pop and candy but they are a pretty expensive option. Not sure if it's the sales tax on pre-prepared foods, but I don't see 10% making as big a difference as I notice.

20oz bottle of pop here is around USD 3.00 (as a comparison).

Dd

[Partha]

There may certainly be some simple differences - Australia isn't nearly as spread out like America is, and I'm reasonably certain that the level of income disparity is smaller there than here. Those factors alone will influence product selection. And that bottle of pop is twice as much as it costs here....which may be the kind of tax Embar's thinking of - but again, hard to see what that does other than hurt the poorest Americans.

[Ddrak]

There may certainly be some simple differences - Australia isn't nearly as spread out like America is, and I'm reasonably certain that the level of income disparity is smaller there than here. Those factors alone will influence product selection. And that bottle of pop is twice as much as it costs here....which may be the kind of tax Embar's thinking of - but again, hard to see what that does other than hurt the poorest Americans.

Can't say on the "spread out" thing - our cities seem as spread out as those in the US, but with the population much lower we don't have nearly the number of cities. Income disparity is a little higher in the US, but not massively (35 vs 45 on Gini index).

Honestly - don't know enough. The idea of the tax still seems good to me but you'd want to be careful implementing anything like that to ensure the secondary effects were minimized.

Dd

[Partha]

Interesting on the Gini Index, I wouldn't have surmised that to be the case at first glance. Then again, you guys DO have socialized health care.

And your observation...

The idea of the tax still seems good to me but you'd want to be careful implementing anything like that to ensure the secondary effects were minimized.

...assumes that the people who want to implement it really care about secondary effects. I don't believe any such nonsense.

[Ddrak]

And your observation...

The idea of the tax still seems good to me but you'd want to be careful implementing anything like that to ensure the secondary effects were minimized.

...assumes that the people who want to implement it really care about secondary effects. I don't believe any such nonsense.

That's the problem with a representative democracy isn't it? All politics is about selling the major short-term impacts, and if possible buying votes by giving swing voters money.

Dd