Posted on 02/22/2017 5:07:46 AM PST by Prov1322
Two months into the citys sweetened-beverage tax, supermarkets and distributors are reporting a 30 percent to 50 percent drop in beverage sales and are planning for layoffs.
One of the city's largest distributors says it will cut 20 percent of its workforce in March, and an owner of six ShopRite stores in Philadelphia says he expects to shed 300 workers this spring.
People are seeing sales decline larger than anything theyve seen up to this point in the city, said Alex Baloga, vice president of external relations at the Pennsylvania Food Merchants Association.
In response, the city questioned the legitimacy of the early figures and predicted that customers responding to the initial sticker shock by shopping outside the city would return.
We have no way of knowing if their sales figures and predicted job losses are anything more than fear-mongering to prevent this from happening in other cities, said city spokesman Mike Dunn.
Mayor Kenney harshly rebuked reports of coming layoffs late Tuesday night.
(Excerpt) Read more at philly.com ...
I guess the do-gooders, save-us-from-ourselves taxers are happy.
If people aren’t spending their money on soda, they’ll spend it elsewhere.
I am not keen on such taxes, mind you, but if I had my way I wouldn’t let people buy soda and the like with government benefits—which would probably cut soda purchases even more.
So they’ll start closing their Philadelphia locations and creating “food deserts”, leading to more whining and gnashing of teeth by Liberals.
It's $0.15 per ounce.
“President Obama signed the tax hike the biggest to take effect in his first term on his 16th day in office, reversing two vetoes by President Bush. The federal cigarette tax jumped from 39 cents to $1.01 per pack on April 1, 2009, to finance expanded health care for children. Since then, the change has brought in more than $30 billion in new revenue, tax records show.
Yet the tax hike and its repercussions remain mostly unknown to the non-smoking public. The tax increase’s size and national reach lifted prices 22% overnight, more than all state and local tax hikes combined over the past decade when adjusted for inflation.”
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/story/2012-09-10/cigarette-tax-smoking/57737774/1
How soon we forget. Liberal pukes raise taxes, it’s what they do.
The tax-racketeers probably thought they’d get a cash cow, like they do w/tobacco taxes.
But the addiction to nicotine is much stronger than than any desire for soda. Caffeine can be met w/coffee and tea.
I think, along the same lines, there won’t be a lot black market soda out there, but there is potential now.
It’s a lot more cumbersome to smuggle heavy liquids en masse across state lines so this’d not make it as profitable for store keeps.
If they start using tax stamps for soda, you’d have something there to make a buck on.
Soda does go bad.
Here in cheaper part of state, I buy 35 cent can (12 ounces) of pop sometimes at grocery store. If I bought it in Philly, tax would add 18 cents to cost for total of 53 cents per can, more than 150% of previous price.
Easy to drive to the store just outside city limits and buy soda for the neighborhood.
I live in PA - food is tax exempt here
And South of the Rio Grande, it is NOT going well with Coca Cola or Pepsi. They social media sites in Mexico, people who are made at Donald Trump for pulling the Ford Expansion into their country have now gotten many Mexicans to boycott Walmart, AutoZone, Pizza Hut, Krispy Kremes, Starbucks and Coca Cola.. It has dropped, I don’t know how much.
There was a cigarette tax in Phoenix but to avoid it, the owner would drive his station wagon to the suburb town of Mesa and load up on cigarettes without a tax stamp.
I worked there for four years until I graduated and went into the Air Force. No tax agents from the city ever came in during that time to question why we were selling non-taxed cigarettes by not buying his cigarettes in Phoenix.
This scheme was illegal but the amount of the tax versus the volume of cigarettes we sold out of that liquor store resulted in a sizable profit for the owner.
So is soda tax exempt? The story I linked reported that although soda is classified as ‘food’ & exempt in many states, it is not exempt in Pennsylvania.
Food is exempt from STATE sales tax here in PA.
Being a First Class City, Philly is empowered to get away with all sorts of shenanigans under their Home Rule Charter.
Thankfully they’re the only First Class City in the State under current law.
“Mayor Kenney harshly rebuked reports of coming layoffs late Tuesday night. Democrats live in their own fake world and will accept actual reality. No one is shopping for soda outside of the city - why of course not they’re Democrats and Democrats are willing to sacrifice for the common good - right? Ha ha ha ha what schmucks! Democrats are morons that can never get the concept of dynamic scoring.
24 oz beers are a buck-six out the door here, don’t need a calculator to run the numbers on that one. Burp!
Tax avoidance is illegal.
It is every citizen’s duty to pay taxes.
Does that make Pittsburgh a second class city? I kid I kid!
Now apply the tax effects on the entire economy and you realize where the Bye bye American pie effect came from.
1.5. Cents per ounce on a gallon about iced tea is $1.92 on a product that sells for $2.50
Insane
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