“We ain’t got the money for no more taxes!”
The WV beverage tax guys are spending a lot of money on advertising. So you’ve probably seen some stuff about how that tax is gonna hurt local business and drive people to buy drinks in other states. Well that’s a nice thought and all but who might be paying for a bunch of ads that support everyone buying sugar water? It’s probably not all the businesses that stand a chance of losing a small amount of business(no honey don’t grab that $27 dollar “Red Dull Mega Monster I’m Still Tired” here, wait till we drive an hour away to another state). If I had to guess, it’s people that stand a much better chance of losing way more money.
History repeats itself
I wonder if this is anything like in Mexico, where they are trying to implement a much higher beverage tax in an attempt to save their people from an addiction to sugar water. The sugar water companies have taken advantage of the people down there so badly, people are giving it to their infants. Children are getting all of their teeth removed by age 5 and 10 because of the sugar drinks. Sugar knocks the good bacteria out of our gut, once this happens, our body can’t absorb nutrients from the food and food-like products we eat. Our teeth rot and our organs and glands start shutting down, leading to obesity and all types of issues. Check out how ^@#ed up Mexico is from sugar water by watching Jamie Oliver’s Sugar Rush Documentary on YouTube it’s just under an hour and really good. These people have billboards for sugar water in their communities that mimic their attire and culture. Then these people offer this sugar water to something as part of their culture and drink it to be prosperous, it’s crazy.
So maybe this beverage tax is a good thing??
Maybe it’s because I’m a health nut but taxing sugar water sounds pretty awesome to me. I got my first taste of the poor health conditions this state is known for when I worked at Food Lion for a few months. A little girl, maybe 7-9 years old weighing in at 140+ comes running down the aisle yelling “Caaaaake!” After her mom finally caught up, they left with 2 huge cakes in their cart full of everything but food. They even had a few cases of liquid sugar hanging over the edge of the cart like pros. That kid has a very slim chance at living a health life, all because of an addiction to sugar.
I think sourcing clean plain water is expensive enough, charging people that willingly harm themselves a little extra to pay for medical schooling infrastructure sounds pretty cool to me.
From http://www.legis.state.wv.us/WVCODE/code.cfm?chap=11&art=19
“All revenue collected by the commissioner under the provisions of this article, less such costs of administration as are hereinafter provided for, shall be paid by him into a special medical school fund, which is hereby created in the state treasury, to be used solely for the construction, maintenance and operation of a four-year school of medicine, dentistry and nursing, as otherwise provided by law.”