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Soda will cost you more in Philadelphia, Seattle, Boulder, Colorado, and a bunch of California cities because politicians in those places voted to tax it. The social engineers claim soda taxes will "reduce obesity," "lower diabetes rates," "reduce medical costs," etc. But the politicians' main goal is to bring in money. Philadelphia city council members applauded wildly when their tax passed. But store owner Melvin Robinson says, "It's a bad tax." Robinson, who runs Bruno's Pizza, says the soda tax punishes his business. His customers quickly agreed. One I interviewed for my new YouTube/Facebook/Twitter video angrily said, "Who should pay...

While the rest of us were popping champagne to celebrate the arrival of 2018, Seattle greeted the New Year with a 1.75 cent per ounce tax on sweetened beverages. It was needed, former Mayor Ed Murray once said, for a host of noble reasons: to reduce sugar consumption; to raise revenue for important projects like a year of “free” community college for all graduating public high school students; and, to subsidize purchases of healthy foods by low-income families.Before he resigned in disgrace over multiple allegations of personal misconduct, Murray considered the soda tax one of his greatest accomplishments, a “cutting...

New Mexico Democratic Sen. Jerry Ortiz y Pino has introduced a joint memorial, asking the Legislative Finance Committee to study the potential positives and negatives of a statewide tax on sodas and other sugary drinks. Governor Susana Martinez weighed in on the idea Wednesday, posting her thoughts on Facebook. “Liberal Democrats are pushing a soda tax again…Less than a year after voters in the state’s most liberal city easily rejected a tax on soda, Senate Democrats want to raise taxes on soda statewide. No matter the budget situation, Senate Democrats have tried to raise taxes every year since I’ve been...

In November, 2016, the Cook County Board of Confiscators created a new tax on most non-alcoholic beverages – punitive, astronomical, and unconstitutional. Virtually everything that could be wrong with a government policy was wrong with this one, and the community reacted with unexpected force. County commissioners reported receiving more complaints about this issue than on any other issue in their careers. Despite a united front held by County Board President Toni Preckwinkle through the summer 2017 implementation, the resolve of her members soon withered as the real effects of the hated tax began to be felt. In the end, it...

The Cook County Board finished the job on Wednesday and repealed the controversial pop tax, which means soda drinkers won’t have to pay it come Dec. 1. ... The repeal was a foregone conclusion after the board’s Finance Committee voted 15-1 on Tuesday, signaling the pop tax would be scrapped after just four months.

Last month we looked at the state of the Cook County, Illinois soda tax, passed into law in December of last year. They had barely gotten the sin tax (which affects Chicago primarily) into motion before realizing that it probably violates the state constitution. They have a workaround in progress which seems dodgy enough as it is, and for the time being they are collecting it. The county executives insisted that it would work out for the best, improving everyone’s health and raising tons of money.Long before it went to effect we were warning the county that this experiment...

Reflections on doing business in Illinois in 2017… The pundit class, and our cousins in the political class as well, have said and written much about the spate of new taxes, spending, and regulations in Illinois that have hit, and will continue to hit, in Chicago, in Cook County, and across Illinois this year. First, the minimum wage was hiked… Illinois was already a dollar over the national minimum wage, so Cook County passed an ordinance to jump to $10/hour on July 1, 2017, then to increase by another dollar per year through 2020, when it would hit $13/hour… and...

Life in Chicagoland, and the unfulfilling refreshment of a temporary stay… (this is the third in a series on the new Cook County soda tax): For all we like to say about the great culture of THE ancient Greeks – for all intents and purposes, they invented theater, you know! – they were really just as human as the rest of us. Sometimes, no matter how well the story was going, they wrote themselves into a corner. There was just no way to resolve the situation and end the play. So what did they do? They rigged up a contraption...

On July 1 – barring a court order or a last minute act of legislative wisdom or fear (at this point, we’ll take either) – Cook County will implement a “Soda Tax,” a brand new penny-per-ounce beverage tax on non-alcoholic drinks that exceed certain threshold of either regular or diet sweeteners. It will capture virtually all regular and diet soda pop, most juice drinks, and either many or most other flavored drinks, such as sport drinks, frappucinos, sweetened or diet iced teas, lemonade, etc. Much has been said and written about the outlandish nature of this tax. Charged in addition...

Contemplations on the new Cook County Soda Tax... Cook County, Illinois - the home of America’s fourth largest city - Chicago, is, like many metro areas, broke. So, as many jurisdictions do when broke, they imagine a need to raise tax rates. The one they have chosen for July 1, 2017 is a soda tax, in addition to any applicable sales tax, which in Illinois can be as high as ten percent ad valorem already. This new “soda tax” is not just on soda, but on any beverage that is sweetened with either sugar or artificial sweetener (so it applies...

It’s been six months since the city’s soda tax (or, more accurately, the sugary beverage tax) was implemented — and it’s off to a rocky start. The city is currently $20 million short of its projected $46 million goal to close out the 2017 fiscal year, and based on the most available month’s numbers, it doesn’t appear as though they will reach it. But I’m not surprised by any of this. By the time last June when Mayor Kenney pulled a fast one on City Council to strike the deal, I had already warned about the consequences in lower-income communities.

The mayor of Seattle has altered the rules of his proposed soda tax — which would fund education for minorities–to include diet drinks because affluent white people tend to consume them more. Mayor Ed Murray of the staunchly liberal Seattle city originally proposed the soda tax during his state of the city address in February. Under his initial plan, distributors of sugary drinks would have to pay 2 cents per ounce. It would cover sodas such as Coke and Pepsi, energy drinks like Red Bull, fruit drinks, sweetened teas and bottled coffees such as those sold by Starbucks. The Mayor claimed the tax would bring $16 million in...

SANTA FE – A national trend in favor of so-called “soda tax” initiatives took a hit Tuesday when Santa Fe voters soundly rejected a proposed 2-cents-per-ounce tax on the distributors of sugar-sweetened beverages in a special election unlike anything New Mexico’s capital city has seen before. Santa Fe’s 2-cents-per-ounce proposal would have matched Boulder, Colo., as the highest in the nation and was aimed at financing an effort to make 1,000 pre-kindergarten education slots available to Santa Fe children for free or at affordable rates. The campaign drew intense interest locally and money poured in from outside the state, with...

Voters in New Mexico’s capital city rejected a tax increase on sweetened beverages Tuesday, handing a rare victory to the soft-drink industry after a string of recent defeats. The tax failed with 11,533 votes against and only 8,382 votes in favor, the Santa Fe City Clerk’s Office announced. The special election came after similar taxes were adopted last year in cities from Philadelphia to San Francisco. Outside groups and political committees spent more than $3 million on the special election in Santa Fe, with opponents led by the soft-drink industry and supporters by billionaire Michael Bloomberg, a staunch supporter of...

Coca-Cola says Philadelphia’s new tax on sweetened drinks is seriously hurting their business in the city. According to a story on the beverage company’s website, the company’s volume in Philadelphia is down 32 percent from a year ago. Fran McGorry, president and general manager of the local bottler known as Philly Coke, says because of the lost sales, the company’s workforce has been reduced by about 40 positions. The company has more than 700 workers in the region. …

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Wednesday that cigarette prices in the city would go up $2.50 to $13 which, de Blasio bragged, would be "the highest price in the country." . . . Council Member Fernando Cabrera, who introduced the bill to create the licensing requirement for e-cigarette retailers, described the proposal as "a major step to limit the use of e-cigarettes, which are dangerous nicotine delivery systems that can lead to nicotine and potentially drug addiction."

Since Jan. 1, the city of Philadelphia has implemented a 1.5 cent per ounce tax on soda and other sweetened beverages, causing businesses to incur losses and lay off workers, the New York Post reported. PepsiCo announced last week that it saw a 43 percent drop in business because of the new tax and would lay off 80 to 100 employees over the next few months. Canada Dry also has eliminated positions due to declining business.

Pepsi says slumping sales from Philadelphia’s new sweetened-beverage tax are prompting layoffs of 80 to 100 workers at three distribution plants that serve the city. The company sent out notices Wednesday saying layoffs will occur at plants in north and south Philadelphia and in Wilmington, Delaware, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported. Dave DeCecco, spokesman for the Purchase, New York-based company that employs 423 people in the city, said the tax has cut sales by 40 percent there. …

Some Philadelphia supermarkets and beverage distributors say they’re gearing up for layoffs because the city’s new soda tax has cut beverage sales by 30 percent to 50 percent, worse than the city predicted. An owner of six supermarkets tells The Philadelphia Inquirer he expects to cut 300 jobs, and a soft drink distributor predicts a 20 percent workforce reduction. City officials expect business to rebound once customers get over sticker shock. …

When Philadelphia became the first US city to pass a soda tax last summer, city officials were eagerly looking forward to the surplus-tax funded windfall to plug gaping budget deficits (and, since this is Philadelphia, the occasional embezzlement scheme). Then, one month ago, after the tax went into effect on January 1st we showed the tax applied in practice: a receipt for a 10 pack of flavored water carried a 51% beverage tax. And since  PA has a sales tax of 6% and Philly already charges another 2%, the total sales tax was 8%. In other words, a purchase...