Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Welcome to The New Coffee Room. We hope you enjoy your visit.


You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.


Join our community!


If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
The Argument for an Obesity Tax
Topic Started: Dec 18 2008, 11:02 AM (315 Views)
QuirtEvans
Member Avatar
I Owe It All To John D'Oh
http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/12/18/paterson.obesity/index.html
It would be unwise to underestimate what large groups of ill-informed people acting together can achieve. -- John D'Oh, January 14, 2010.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Aqua Letifer
Member Avatar
ZOOOOOM!
Kind of makes sense. Personal responsibility goes out the window when you refuse to do it.

(5 more, Quirt.)

I cite irreconcilable differences.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
brenda
Member Avatar
..............
four
“Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.”
~A.A. Milne
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
ivorythumper
Member Avatar
I am so adjective that I verb nouns!
If they want to go after childhood obesity, they should tax sugared cereals as well.

But wasn't there a recent study that showed folks were not losing and in fact gaining weight on diet sodas?
The dogma lives loudly within me.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mikhailoh
Member Avatar
If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
I think blaming soda pop for obesity is pretty lame when we have McDonalds, Taco Bell and 500 calories Starbucks latte vendors on every street.
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
OperaTenor
Member Avatar
Pisa-Carp
And then there's this to consider:

Genetic Variants Tied to Obesity

Monday, December 15, 2008; 12:00 AM

MONDAY, Dec. 15 (HealthDay News) -- Certain people just may be destined to be obese, based on the discovery of six additional genetic variants tied to people with higher body mass index, a new study says.

The study by an international consortium, published online Dec. 14 in Nature Genetics, adds to previous research that linked two other genetic variants to obesity.

"One of the interesting things is that the genes near these variants are all active in the central nervous system, suggesting that inherited variation in appetite regulation may have something to do with people's predisposition to obesity," study leader Dr. Joel Hirschhorn of Children's Hospital Boston and the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, said in a news release issued by some of the consortium participants.

The study, by the Genetic Investigation of Anthropometric Traits (GIANT) consortium, concluded that each individual known variant had a small but cumulative effect on a person's BMI, a ratio of weight to height. In all, it added up to an average of 10 pounds in those with most of the variants, compared to those with the fewest. However, Hirschhorn said the researchers may have found only a handful of possibly hundreds of genetic regions that made such small contributions to one's weight, and more studies would be needed to uncover them all.

"As we learn more about what some of the genes in these regions do, we hope that these discoveries might suggest routes to new therapies for obesity," joint first author of the study, Dr. Elizabeth Speliotes of Massachusetts General Hospital, said in the news release.

Previous studies in families or twins have found that genetics account for up to 70 percent of BMI variation in the general population.

The World Health Association estimates that more than 1 billion adults worldwide are overweight, with at least 300 million of them classified as obese (having a BMI of 30 or above).


********************************

Of course, being obese, I'll look for any excuse I can.....



Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
ivorythumper
Member Avatar
I am so adjective that I verb nouns!
Mikhailoh
Dec 18 2008, 11:11 AM
I think blaming soda pop for obesity is pretty lame when we have McDonalds, Taco Bell and 500 calories Starbucks latte vendors on every street.
But it does four things:

1) it allows the public to think that something is being done
2) it focuses the attention on an easy target.
3) it perpetuates the modernist view that regulation is better than virtue
4) it introduces yet another tax
The dogma lives loudly within me.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mikhailoh
Member Avatar
If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
Focus on number 4.
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
ivorythumper
Member Avatar
I am so adjective that I verb nouns!
I saved the best for last.
The dogma lives loudly within me.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mark
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
tax! tax! tax!

WTF is wrong with us?
___.___
(_]===*
o 0
When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Axtremus
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
Mark
Dec 18 2008, 11:20 AM
tax! tax! tax!

WTF is wrong with us?
Wait... I thought you are for "consumption tax," no?
This "sugar tax" is a "consumption tax," no? :blink:
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mark
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
Only if we eliminate the income tax.
___.___
(_]===*
o 0
When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Bernard
Member Avatar
Senior Carp
I'm against the government micro-managing people's lives. Is he planning to tax granulated sugar? 100% fruit juice (high in calories)? Oh, I know! Why don't we just tax calories consumed! There's an idea. Anything over the RDA will be taxed at double the standard rate.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Axtremus
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
OK, that's fair.

Think of it this way: NY wants to raise taxes somewhere. They chose to raise it via consumption tax instead of of income tax.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mark
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
NY can go to hell.

Bunch of leftwing communist nutjobs.
___.___
(_]===*
o 0
When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Axtremus
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
Bernard
Dec 18 2008, 11:25 AM
I'm against the government micro-managing people's lives. Is he planning to tax granulated sugar? 100% fruit juice (high in calories)? Oh, I know! Why don't we just tax calories consumed! There's an idea.
Yes, I have the same question, actually... are they just taxing sugar or also high fructose corn syrup?
Do both have comparable calorie content, or does one contribute more to obesity than the other?
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
QuirtEvans
Member Avatar
I Owe It All To John D'Oh
That does it, Mark, your name has been put on a watch list. The next time you try to enter New York for a piano party, you'll be stopped at the border.
It would be unwise to underestimate what large groups of ill-informed people acting together can achieve. -- John D'Oh, January 14, 2010.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Bernard
Member Avatar
Senior Carp
Well what about candy!? I say forget this tax nonsense, it's so arbitrary. I find the statistic of 1 in 4 or 1 in 3 children being obese hard to believe based on what I see on a daily basis on the street. I also see an awful lot of smokers and if there's a decrease it's not plainly evident.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Copper
Member Avatar
Shortstop
Bernard
Dec 18 2008, 11:29 AM
Well what about candy!? I say forget this tax nonsense, it's so arbitrary. I find the statistic of 1 in 4 or 1 in 3 children being obese hard to believe based on what I see on a daily basis on the street. I also see an awful lot of smokers and if there's a decrease it's not plainly evident.

Yes, Bernard has this right.

People harm themselves in so many ways.

I don't see why the government should poke it's nose into this one.

Of course if there is Federal health care for everyone, then everything becomes the government's business.

Maybe we should make a list of things the feds will have to worry about when they are in charge of our health related choices.

Things that can change our health
Exercise – or lack thereof
Food
Work
Friends
Alcohol
Cigarettes
Any kind of sex – or lack thereof
Forum posts
And so on...
The Confederate soldier was peculiar in that he was ever ready to fight, but never ready to submit to the routine duty and discipline of the camp or the march. The soldiers were determined to be soldiers after their own notions, and do their duty, for the love of it, as they thought best. Carlton McCarthy
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
George K
Member Avatar
Finally
An article linked by Quirt a while ago:
Fat Factors

Suggest that there's an infectious link with obesity.

We should tax bacteria and viruses.

A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mikhailoh
Member Avatar
If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
I say we tax doctors and lawyers.

Oh, wait.. we already do. Never mind.
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mark
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
I say we reduce our government to constitutional levels that our founders set forth.

Get rid of all this waste and watch the country get wealthy again.
___.___
(_]===*
o 0
When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
jon-nyc
Member Avatar
Cheers
Mark
Dec 18 2008, 11:26 AM
NY can go to hell.

Bunch of leftwing communist nutjobs.
That's Mr. leftwing, communist nutjob to you, pal.

:wave:
In my defense, I was left unsupervised.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mark
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
Love ya Jon! :wave:

Just because your wrong on the political ideology front doesn't mean I don't like you.

You're just wrong that's all. :P
___.___
(_]===*
o 0
When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
« Previous Topic · The New Coffee Room · Next Topic »
Add Reply