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The city wanted to bring in more money, in part for early childhood education. But such taxes are disproportionately paid by the poor.Want a soda? You'll pay more for one in Philadelphia, because five years ago, local politicians decided to tax it. They're "protecting" people, they said. The tax would "reduce obesity" and "lower diabetes rates." But their main goal was to bring in more money, which they said would "fund early childhood education" and "help a lot of families." I reported on this five years ago, right after the tax went into effect. My new video updates what happened....

Berkeley’s City Council has passed an ordinance that will remove unhealthy food from grocery store checkout aisles. The ordinance is the first of its kind in the U.S., supporters said. The new policy will require retailers larger than 2,500 square feet to stock healthy food at the register and in areas where customers wait in line, instead of items like chips, soda and candy. It forbids food items with 5 grams of added sugars and 200 milligrams of sodium, chewing gum and mints with added sugars, and beverages with added sugars or artificial sweeteners. In Berkeley, the policy will affect...

Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg claims he is ready to spend more than $1 billion in an effort to oust President Trump, but money may not be bringing supporters to his campaign. Just 45 people showed up to Bloomberg's latest rally with TV star Judge Judy Sheindlin in Texas on Saturday.

Philadelphia’s outlandish soda tax is what Democratic-party politics looks like when it lets its freak flag fly. So many classic elements are there: (failed) social engineering and “think of the children!” on one side, paid for with a punitive tax on poor people and destroyed businesses, which means destroyed jobs, which in turn means lives upended. What lives? Greedy capitalists with monocles, maybe? No, they’ll be fine. Think of ex-cons trying to regain their footing in society. To review this debacle, in 2017 Philadelphia, seeking to fund a universal pre-K program, slapped mammoth sin taxes on Coke and Pepsi (and...

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is prepared to spent upwards of $100 million should he mount a 2020 bid for the White House, according to CNBC. Howard Wolfson, the billionaire business magnate's top political advisor, told the news outlet that Bloomberg spent more than $100 million in his last campaign for New York City mayor in 2009. "Last time I looked, NYC is a fraction of the size of the country as a whole," Wolfson said in an email to the outlet. ADVERTISEMENT Wolfson added that Bloomberg would spend "whatever is required" on his own campaign if he...

The Philadelphia City Council on Thursday voted 13-4 in favor of a bill that became known as the “soda tax.” It will impose a 1.5-cent tax per ounce for soft drinks and other sugar-sweetened beverages include fruit drinks, sports drinks, flavored water, and energy drinks. The tax goes into effect at the beginning of next year. Notably, it excludes baby formula, any product that has a base that is majority milk, and some other healthier offerings predetermined by the city.

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg found out firsthand how unpopular laws banning sugary drinks could be. Not only did he encounter strong opposition from those who felt his proposed prohibition on large sodas was an attack on liberty, he also heard from those critics who felt New Yorkers would only purchase multiple beverages or find another way to circumvent the mandate. While his attempt was ultimately unsuccessful, other municipal leaders have made their own attempts to curb cola consumption. Among the latest is Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney’s plan to add three cents per ounce to the cost of...

Having solved all other problems plaguing our society, New York Times opinion author (and food journalist) Mark Bittman has his eye on the big prize. Taking a page from Michael Bloomberg’s big government playbook, Mark is looking for a new way stop people from drinking soda. Since efforts to ban sales of any sort fell flat in the courts (pun intended) the author is looking for more of a generational change, and the way to do that is to stop kids from getting in the habit of drinking the sugary beverages at an early age. How do we do that?...

San Francisco's new legislation requiring sodas to carry health warning labels is being challenged in court by the American Beverage Association. The ABA, joined by the California State Outdoor Advertising Association and California Retailers Association, filed a lawsuit against the city on Friday, arguing that the legislation, which also would ban sugary-drink ads on city property, is a First Amendment violation, reported SFGate. According to Convenience Store and Fuel News, the lawsuit in part alleges that the ban, "discriminates against speech based on the identity of the speaker, in violation of the First Amendment, by expressly prohibiting speech that includes...

<p>The American Beverage Association has sued the city of San Francisco, claiming new legislation requiring health warning labels on sugary beverages and prohibiting advertisements of them on city property violates the First Amendment.</p>

MONTPELIER, VT -- All food and beverages sold through vending machines are now subject to Vermont's 9% meals and rooms tax, effective July 1. A 6% sales tax on sugary drinks is also in effect. The new levies are part of a tax package that lawmakers passed in May to raise a $30 million in new revenue. Lawmakers expect the sales tax on soft drinks to raise about $8 million a year, and applying the meals tax to vending machines to add about $1 million a year. Exempt from Vermont's sugary drink tax are products that contain milk, soy, rice...

From mandates about what food children can eat to draconian attendance policies, it’s becoming increasingly clear that parental rights do not exist when you send your child to public school, as The Blaze’s Matt Walsh has argued before. But in Seattle, it’s even worse. In at least 13 public schools in the area, where kids are banned from even having soda or candy, middle and high school-aged girls can get a taxpayer-funded IUD without their parents’ consent. CNS News reports: [Long-acting reversible contraceptives] are associated with serious side effects, such as uterine perforation and infection. IUDs, specifically, can also act as abortifacients by...

San Francisco officials are deciding whether to impose a warning on ads for a favorite drink of children and a bane of public health advocates: Sugary soda pop. The "Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Warning Ordinance" would require health warnings on advertising within city limits — on billboards, walls, the sides of cabs and buses. Supporters and opponents say San Francisco would be the first place in the country to require warnings on ads for soda, which is linked to rotting teeth and obesity.

It’s a four-letter word that parents in one Northern California city don’t want their children to hear: soda. In a novel approach to fighting childhood obesity, the Davis City Council voted unanimously this week to approve an ordinance making milk and water the default options for kids’ meals — a victory for parents who want to shield children from sugary beverages. Cashiers and waiters in fast food joints and other restaurants that market meals to kids will be forced, under threat of a fine to the business, to offer water or milk with those meals, not Coke or Pepsi.

A can of Coke could soon look like a pack of Marlboros, if one Bronx lawmaker has his way. Assemblyman Jeff Dinowitz has introduced the “Sugar-Sweetened Beverages Safety Warning Act” — which would require tobacco-style health- warning labels on all sugary drinks, such a cola, iced tea and energy drinks. The labels would read: “SAFETY WARNING: Drinking beverages with added sugar contributes to obesity, diabetes and tooth decay.”

Voters in Berkeley, Calif., have passed the nation’s first soda tax with a resounding 75 percent of the vote. The measure aims to reduce the effects of sugar consumption on health, especially increased rates of obesity and diabetes. It will levy a penny-per-ounce tax on most sugar-sweetened beverages and is estimated to raise more than $1 million per year. Proceeds will go to the general fund; Measure D calls for the creation of a health panel to advise Berkeley’s City Council on appropriate health programs to receive funding. Campaign Co-Chair Jack Daniels called Berkeley’s win a tipping point. “I think...

The progressive War on Soda may have failed in New York, despite the best efforts of the Deplorable Nanny State Mayor, but this is a multi-front battle which will clearly rage on for some time. As any good battle commander will tell you, when fighting an opponent with numerical superiority, it’s best to drag them into a skirmish on your home turf. In the effort to save people from their own ignorant, evil selves, the fight to make soda more expensive – and thereby modify public behavior through tax policy – has moved to Berkeley.

Libertarians were outraged by New York City Mayor Bloomberg’s “Big Gulp” ban (which a state court ultimately struck down). They slammed it as a “Nanny State” measure. But it was current Centers for Disease Control head Tom Frieden who was actually behind the ban.

California cities and counties won’t be allowed to tax soda for the next 12 years after Gov. Jerry Brown signed fast-moving legislation Thursday. The bill, which was first unveiled Saturday evening, prohibits local governments from imposing new taxes on soda until 2031. It comes after a deal was struck between legislators and business and labor interests who agreed to remove an initiative from the Nov. 6 statewide ballot that would have restricted cities and counties from raising any taxes without a supermajority vote of local citizens.

Time and again we hear politicians from different parts of the country profess the virtues of a soda tax. Their reasoning ranges from wanting to improve the public health, by cutting back consumption of unhealthy drinks, to talking about how much revenue it will bring in. This proclivity of nanny statists to push policies to change people’s behavior hues quite closely to Einstein’s definition of insanity: Trying the same thing over and over, expecting different results. Policy makers of all stripes need to abandon their affinity for soda taxes. Put simply, soda taxes just don’t work. Take Berkeley, California, as...