This 'sugar tax' crap is doing my head in!

[GIBURROWS]

As me and my obese scum have paid into the NHS system already why shouldn't we get what we've paid for?

It's not like having a child then claiming benefits for 18 years.

 

[Felon]

exactly. i don't understand one bit why smoking is taxed. my grandad smoked 2 packets and day and died at age 85 because of a totally unrelated cause so he spent all that money on smoke tax to not even use it. ridiculous given that people want cigarettes, punishing manufactures with a tax because they are supplying what the public want it perverse.

Same with my grandad, he smoked those woodbine cigarettes and died age 86 (I think) of a heart attack, (although he was very unhealthy in lots of other ways - ultimately he was lucky) but I can think of several other people who died terrible slow deaths (COPD) or early through cancer, compared to him getting lucky.

Luck however doesn't beat the statistics, as for roughly 50% of people who smoke - it will be their cause of death whether they're young or old.

Also, I think it's very naive to think that tobacco companies are suppling cigarettes to the public, simply because that's what the public want - therefore we should simply let them have free reign to do sell what they like. This is because the product they sell, has been engineered and developed on purpose to exploit human biology, and it exploits it in a way which makes it almost impossible to stop using that product once you've started, so it's less about what the consumer wants and more about how to exploit them to make as much money as possible.

We're in a similar position with the food industry right now; roughly 60-70% of all food in the supermarket has no real nutritional benefits, the majority of it has been engineered and processed to taste as amazing as possible, regardless of the impact to health. Food has become more about pleasure and indulgence than sustenance, as a result people are disproportionately eating food that tastes amazing, because it's been engineered to exploit our biology - our natural cravings for sweet and rich foods. For example, they produce foods which contain large amounts of sugar and fat at the same time - something which doesn't exist in any natural food source, but is very addictive.

At the end of the day it's exploitation, big companies don't behave morally - they behave in a way which will make them the most money, whether it's piling sugar into something to make it taste amazing, or trans fats into a cheap pies so that they can shift as many as possible - both of which are making millions ill and killing thousands.

 

[LeeUK]

Those 35p price marked energy drink cans sold in convenience stores up and down the country have been reduced to 30p since the sugar tax. Now sure how they managed that!

Oh and the "fat people costing the NHS more" argument... oh please, get back to reading your Daily Mail/Express/Sun you heartless Tory scum.

 

[LeeUK]

Can't drink Rubicon anymore Used to like that... damn sweeteners.

******* sugar tax... I might be a fat **** but it wasn't because of sugary drinks and only had them once in a while... rubicon lychee was the only decent lychee drink I've found in this country and now it no longer exists Mango was good too.

They've received so many complaints they've closed comments on their facebook page.

But oh... they do a deluxe range of the non-fizzy ones in Mango and Guava... dammit... I liked the fizzy ones & lychee no more

Rubicon Lychee 24 can slab on Amazon with Prime delivery. Not sure if this is the one you want or some re-engineered sugar free version.

 

[Destination]

As me and my obese scum have paid into the NHS system already why shouldn't we get what we've paid for?

It's not like having a child then claiming benefits for 18 years.

Well mainly because it costs more than you have paid in.
Lets see how happy people are when they start ramping up the tax and NI rates over the next few years to pay for the morbidity of fat people getting fatter.
I would rather have the tax directly on the products causing it, rather than rate against what i earn rather than what i consume.

 

[crinkleshoes]

Rubicon Lychee 24 can slab on Amazon with Prime delivery. Not sure if this is the one you want or some re-engineered sugar free version.

Unless they have old stock, it's the "reduced" sugar version with sweeteners. They halved the sugar and added sweeteners.

I'd rather they just halved the sugar and left the sweeteners out of it... it was a bit over-sweet, so half sugar would have still tasted really good.

I have now noticed that they have done the same to "normal" Ribena too... dammit!

No more Ribena or Rubicon for me Now all I have left is Elderflower Cordial.

 

[Felon]

It's not like having a child then claiming benefits for 18 years.

If you get ill because of your obesity, and end up with metabolic disease (Type-2 diabetes, heart disease, non-alcoholic fatty liver etc) then the costs of treating diseases like those on the NHS - some of which require surgery and treatment over many years, would blow away the cost of childcare, god forbid you end up getting cancer and require full blown treatment - that can run into £hundreds of thousands and more for a protracted treatment.

 

[unwashed potato!]

So your one anecdotal piece of history is sufficient to remove a large amount of tax grab by the government?
How would you fund the difference, if you remove the smoking tax, how would you fund what we don't get from it?

we are agreeing on the same thing. i was pointing out how ridiculous his argument was.

 

[Destination]

we are agreeing on the same thing. i was pointing out how ridiculous his argument was.

damn, my brain is in stupid mode again

 

[Energize]

Because they are being told to by the Govt. They were asked first, said they would then did nothing, hence now stronger measures being taken.

There is a health crises going on if you hadn't noticed and the food industry is not blameless in that. They have unnecessarily high levels of salt and sugar in their food and it's a problem to the nation.

And no, business can't just do what they like, especially in highly regulated areas such as the food industry, they do have to do what they are told. Don't like it? Go into another less regulated business.

Unless you think there should be no regulations and the food industry can put anything they want into food?

I don't think "because the government told them to", is really a convincing argument.

Businesses aren't just doing what they like, they are responding to the demands of the public. No I don't think they should be able to put anything they want in food, where did you get that from? I do think they should be allowed to put food products such as salt and sugar in food though obviously.

So, 'what people want' is not the best measure of 'what is best' for the country. And before you come back with the 'individual responsibility' or 'why should I suffer because others can't control themselves' arguments, we've tried that and it most demonstrably doesn't work.

For a start the manufacturer is not being punished, it's the consumer who has to pay the tax. Secondly, the manufacturer doesn't have to reduce the sugar content if they think the consumer will pay the higher price. But obviously they think the price point is important so reduced the sugar.

No one is stopping you gorging yourself on sugar if you want, but to have so much intrinsically put into our food is ridiculous, especially since its just used as a cheap bulking agent for profit and has no useful nutritional aspect to it at all.

The levy is applied to manufacturers, some pass it on to the consumer some don't.

I don't really care about what is "best for the country", I think individuals should be able to choose how they live their life and deal with the consequences, putting sin taxes on products is actively interfering with free choice.

How would you address the NHS issues with regards forthcoming diabetes apocalypse?
If manufacturers continue to buff yup whey and sugar into everything, things that never historically had it, how would you tackle the issues that taxpayers will face?

My preferred solution is to abolish the NHS and have a universal healthcare system similar to the Japanese model.

It's saying looking at the nation as a whole, obese people "are" going to cost the NHS more money - no-one can say whether you individually will or not. You may just drop dead immediately from your stroke.

Easily, we all pay a base level for a general health needs throughout life eg: accident, disease, child birth etc etc then certain activities which have a severely detrimental effect to your health can have a 'sin tax' if you like to call it that, to pay for the extra demands on the NHS your choice is making.

Do you complain as much when they increase the duty on cigarettes?

Edit : Looking at some of your previous posts, I would have thought you'd like sin taxes [unless you oppose taxes in general?] as it's getting the individual to pay more based on their own actions, rather than sharing that cost across all taxpayers including those acting responsibly

Here's a post of yours from 2014 where you seem quite amenable to the idea of higher prices for activities with long term expensive medical issues to encourage people to change their behaviour?

I have absolutely no idea what context that post was made in, not sure why you trawled up a 2014 post?! But I can tell you that in 2018 I am opposed to sin taxes. For a start drinking alcohol or coca cola etc in moderate amounts doesn't damage your health, secondly there are so many variables that effect your health that the idea of having a "base level" topped up by a handful of sin taxes is just a non starter, there are a million activities that risk injury and use of the NHS services, taking a handful of products and taxing them is just completely inconsistent.

 

[unwashed potato!]

Businesses aren't just doing what they like, they are responding to the demands of the public.

no they are not.

No I don't think they should be able to put anything they want in food, where did you get that from? I do think they should be allowed to put food products such as salt and sugar in food though obviously.

you think they shouldn't be allowed to put bad stuff in food and drinks, but they should be allowed to put bad stuff in food and drink?

seems you're agreeing with the way it now is. they aren't allowed to put anything they like in food, stuff that poisons for instance, but they can put all the sugar and salt that they want in.

i can guarantee those who opposed and regulation on smoking once they realised how bad it was, were saying the exact same silly things as you're right now. 20/30 years time we will look back on posts like this, and most will think how crazy it is that we allowed to much harmful sugar to be put in our food and drinks without us knowing, and some others will learn nothing and post the same stuff you're saying right now about the latest discovery of terribly food that's being over eaten and causing mass issues.

 

[PaulCa]

No one is stopping you gorging yourself on sugar if you want, but to have so much intrinsically put into our food is ridiculous, especially since its just used as a cheap bulking agent for profit and has no useful nutritional aspect to it at all.

This my friend is modern brain washing. Sugar is one of the most nutritious foods. That's WHY it is causing so much fuss.

What the current pop culture trend is trying to steer you clear of is nutritious foods because people are eating too much. If you can't stop them eating too much - and surely the for-profit food industry would go postal if the government tried to tell them to sell less food - then you have to convince people to eat less nutritious foods.

The only possibly complying argument for the "sugar is not nutritious" mantra is that with sugar sugar high diet you could potentially hit your daily calories allowance without eating enough vitamins etc. Though this is also fairly unlikely unless you literally eat sugar, cake and drinkcoke.

In order of weight:
Carbohydrates
Fats
Protien
Vitiamins

The later is "trace" and measured in micro-grams or milligrams. The former 3 are in abundance in nearly all basic diets.

It's quite simple. ALL life on this planet runs on the same basic machinery. The mitochondria. It's like the PSU in your PC. It turns carbohydrates into energy. That is the equation of life, the equation of metabolism. It has a sugar on one side and energy on the other. All life, generally speaking is made of the same stuff and eats the same stuff (with some bacteria as exception). All life either eats other life or is eaten by other life, so as long as you are eating other life forms and ... they needed mostly the same nutrients as you and thus contain the same nutrients as you need, you will be fine.

The rest is about "essential indexing" where you look at the absolute maximum demand for a certain nutrient in a day and prescribe that your daily diet should meet or exceed that level... just in case. This is really not necessary. Sure it might have some marginal benefits to max'ing all these out but they are significantly diminished returns the further you get from a "normal" diet.

The current propoganda is just part of the same campaign as the sugar tax. What is worse is the world is stock full of charlatan diet advisers and just plain ignorant or dead wrong diet advisers. The main reason the government do not regulate said dietary advisers is simply because it's very difficult, obesity aside, to do yourself much harm by eating badly.

If you look at studies on nutrient deficiencies in the UK with our supposedly terrible diet you will find the most common is vitamin D which is produced by sunlight. There are some lower than would be liked vitamin levels due to eating less greens, but it is in no way a problem. You could technically eat a high sugar diet, as long as it was varied and be 100% healthy... you would just have to eat less of it.

EDIT: One final thing. The difference between protien and vitamins compared to sugars and fats is that the excess of the former typically passes through into the toilet. The later, sugar and fats are stored because they are the most essential to your life. Thus we have obesity.

 

[Freakbro]

there are a million activities that risk injury and use of the NHS services, taking a handful of products and taxing them is just completely inconsistent.

Not the old "what about people who play sports" (etc) strawman?

Are these millions of other activities an impending national health crises threatening to overwhelm the NHS?

No, and when/if they are we can address those too.

 

[Lopéz]

This my friend is modern brain washing.....

 

[Scam]

Sooooo... Anyone found a good alternative to Ribena yet?

 

[Nasher]

Maybe we should calculate exactly what each person needs and just inject it at the start of the day

 

[MikeTheNative]

Maybe we should calculate exactly what each person needs and just inject it at the start of the day

Have you tried huel, the meal replacement shake? It is filling, however I used to have it for breakfast and lunch but i just really wanted to eat something by the end of the day.

 

[GIBURROWS]

If you get ill because of your obesity, and end up with metabolic disease (Type-2 diabetes, heart disease, non-alcoholic fatty liver etc) then the costs of treating diseases like those on the NHS - some of which require surgery and treatment over many years, would blow away the cost of childcare, god forbid you end up getting cancer and require full blown treatment - that can run into £hundreds of thousands and more for a protracted treatment.

Are skinny people immune from those diseases then?

There seems to be a lot of "IF's" thrown around here.

 

[krooton]

EDIT: One final thing. The difference between protien and vitamins compared to sugars and fats is that the excess of the former typically passes through into the toilet. The later, sugar and fats are stored because they are the most essential to your life. Thus we have obesity.

Ha! Yes, excess of vitamins that are not fat soluable will be peed out, but all 3 macro-nutrients will be converted in to fat in calorific excess. You can get obese from eating too much protein too, it just happens less as protein is more expensive and more filling.
Pretty cheap and easy to down a pint of oil and sugar, go over your calorific needs, and still be hungry an hour later.

Also, there are essential proteins and essential fats. There is no such thing as an essential carb. And before you possibly pull the old "Brain needs glucose!!1" trick, there is a little thing called gluconeogenesis.

 

[Felon]

Are skinny people immune from those diseases then?

There seems to be a lot of "IF's" thrown around here.

People who get type-2 diabetes do generally tend to be overweight or obese, there are lots of people of a healthy weight who do get it (around 40%) - but statistically less than people who are overweight or obese. Some studies show that obesity is actually a symptom of metabolic disease, rather than the cause of it - as in obesity travels with the diseases, but doesn't have to be there 100% of the time (which explains fit looking people with type 2)

You do however have the secondary problem of obesity making these diseases far worse, there are a lot of people who mismanage their diabetes and become badly overweight, which causes a whole range of additional problems, which affect things like mobility, (leg ulcers are a common example) which then makes the cost of treating them spiral out of control. (such a person can't work, requires surgery, weeks in hospital, home care, etc)

Someone who has type-2 who gets it under control and maintains a healthy weight, will probably live an almost totally normal life and require practically no treatment for it, (perhaps minimum amounts of medication) someone who doesn't manage their condition and gets badly obese, will ultimately probably end up having very serious complications, all of which will cost a great deal more money.