Residents of the state of New York: Congratulations; you just dodged a bullet.

Photo courtesy of : √oхέƒx™|flickr

Last week, on March 11, New York Governor David Paterson and legislative leaders withdrew plans for a host of controversial and highly unpopular taxes that would have resulted in approximately $1.3 billion in new taxes for the year beginning July 1 .

Paterson suggested the state, which faces a record $14.2 billion deficit, could finally afford to drop the proposed taxes because of money the state will receive as part of the federal stimulus package.

Paterson first presented in December what some people thought is a unique plan to aid in closing the historic state budget gap. Others have called the plan “an attack on personal freedom.”

What the plan proposed was an addition to, or in some cases an expansion of, excise taxes, known popularly as sin taxes.

Paterson wanted the state to increase or add sales taxes to, among other items, sporting event tickets, movie tickets, theater tickets, alcohol (beer, wine and liquor), Internet downloads, taxis, satellite and cable TV, cigars, massages and soft drinks that contain sugar. (See more details of the original tax plan.)

And surprisingly, it’s that last one, sugar-laden soft drinks, that caused the largest outcry among New York’s citizens. San Fransisco considered a similar tax:



The $404 million the soda tax would have raised would be used to fund public health programs, including programs aimed at preventing or reducing the incidence of obesity.

"We are in the midst of a new public health epidemic: childhood obesity," Paterson said in December.



Paterson expected such a tax to reduce the sales of sugar-laden beverages by about 5 percent and the statistics he cited in making his proposal are alarming: One in four children under the age of 18 is obese, and in economically challenged areas, that number may rise to one in three. Only 17 years ago, the obesity rate in New York was about 10 percent -- that's a pretty remarkable jump.

But from the moment the words were out of his mouth, New Yorkers were all over the matter, expressing an almost universal disapproval for what became known as the fat tax.

“Any new tax is a bad tax, particularly in this state where we are taxed to death (highest tax rate in the nation when all taxes are taken into consideration), said Dave Barmen, a small business owner from Upstate New York. “And if you think the revenue from the tax will go to what it's supposedly earmarked for, it's highly unlikely.”

Barmen also attacked the core purpose of the proposed tax – decreasing obesity and related health issues.

“All these laws that restrict personal freedom are antithetical to the whole purpose of this democratic experiment we call the United States,” he said, citing seat belt, helmet, hand-free cell phone and gambling statutes as unfair and unpatriotic. “It's one thing to have laws that protect people from harm inflicted by others ... it's idiotic to have laws that protect us from our own selves.”

And plenty of people agree with Barmen, judging from discourse throughout the blogosphere.

Even people who agree something needs to be done to squelch obesity, and childhood obesity in particular, believe taxing the matter away is neither necessary nor productive.

“Educate children on nutrition. Make home [economics] a mandatory class and make healthy eating the core focus,” one New Yorker suggested. “Because you will not stop people from drinking soda with an 18 percent tax.”

The idea of an 18 percent tax not being enough to deter unwanted behavior is also supported by a sizable segment of the population.

“I think the tax would have to be much higher to have a significant impact,” one blog poster said. “While some may switch to diet, an 18 percent increase is only about a 25 cent increase in total price on a two liter. I think people will pay for it: they are too addicted to their sugar and caffeine not to.”

Beth Walter Honadle is a political science professor at the University of Cincinnati. She specializes in public policy research and says the issue must be looked at from two perspectives.

Excluding tax income as the sole or even primary impetus for the soda tax, that leaves two objectives for the proposed but now aborted implementation: to less the consumption of soft drinks and/or to decrease obesity rates.

Honadle offered as alternatives to taxation educational programs, subsidization of healthier alternatives and on outright ban on the sale of sugared soft drinks.

Although, “We all know how well Prohibition worked out,” she said.

She said that if decreasing obesity is the ultimate goal and government feels it wants or needs to intervene, that intervention could take the form of building more pedestrian-friendly areas, building more bike lanes, requiring more physical education in schools and requiring employers to provide recreational facilities.

But all those things cost money, and doesn’t that just put us right back where we started?

Is fat the new smoking?

Soon-to-be endangered species?

Back in December, the governor of New York, David Paterson, announced a laundry list of some137-plus proposed new or increased taxes. The one that likely received the most publicity is an 18 percent tax on non-diet soft drinks.

"We are in the midst of a new public health epidemic: childhood obesity," Paterson said.

The $404 million the tax would raise would be used to fund public health programs, including programs aimed at preventing or reducing the incidence of obesity.

Paterson also expects such a tax to reduce the sales of sugar-laden beverages by about 5 percent.

The statistics he cites in making his proposal are alarming: One in four children under the age of 18 is obese, and in economically challenged areas, that number may rise to one in three. Only 17 years ago, the obesity rate in New York was about 10 percent -- that's a pretty remarkable jump.

Sure, soda is not of and by itself the cause or even necessarily a cause of obesity, it is a driver of childhood obesity. Furthermore, a recent study by Harvard University researchers (quoted by Paterson in his inital proposal) found that "each additional 12-ounce soft drink consumed per day increases the risk of a child becoming obese by 60 percent. For adults, the association is similar."

But of course New York is certainly not alone in all this bad fat news. A full 30 states can now boast of an obesity rate of 25 percent or higher, and three states -- Mississippi, West Virginia and Alabama -- have obesity rates that weigh in at more than 30 percent.

Ohio, incidentally, places 17th on the 2008 list, an improvent over 2007's 15th place ranking. Colorado, Hawaii and Connecticut are the slimmest states but all still weigh in with obesity rates around 20 percent.

Despite all the studies and statistics, Paterson has been hard pressed to find much support for the so-called fat tax on soda. Quinnipiac University released survey results just a few days ago that indicate 64 percent of registered New Yorkers (1,664 were surveyed) are against the tax, and the plan has been drawing criticism from everywhere from "The Weekly Standard" to the "Daily News" to countless blogs.

But one major source of support comes from Dr. Richard Daines, the state health commissioner for the state of New York. He is widely considered to be the architect of this particular proposal. So passionate is Dr. Daines about the soda issue that he made a YouTube video in support of it.

Yeah, so the video is little dry, but does it make any impact at all?

Here's where I stand on the matter:

I am, at heart, a good little New Yorker. I like a lot of the laws New York has on the books that would cause a great many Ohioans to clasp at their chests while screaming about the infringement upon their right to make (asinine) decisions (i.e. lack of a motorcycle helmet law).

I like that in NY you must wear a helmet while bicycling (and motorcycling). I LOVED living in NY when NY was one of the first states to institute a public smoking ban, and so obviously I strongly approve of the very high cigarette taxes the state has imposed. And I don't disapprove of the transfat ban in NYC. This little bit of legislation, in fact, has changed the way many chain and fast food restaurants operate nationally.

So is obesity the new smoking?

The evidence concerning smoking bans and taxes in undeniable. According to the CDC, smoking rates have dropped from more than 40 percent of the over-18 population in 1965 to approximately 20 percent in 2005, and much of the drop in smoking rates is attributed to increased taxation that began in the late '70s.

So yeah, a fat-tax on soda would okay by me. If it had even a fraction of the impact on obesity that cigarette taxes have had on smoking, I say, "You go for it, Gov. Paterson, New Yorkers will come around." Any maybe, eventually, the rest of the country also.

FYI, Paterson has also proposed taxes (or increased taxes) on downloaded music, movie tickets, beer, wine and cable/satellite television services. I have to admit I would not stop partaking of any of those because of increased taxes.