TranceAddict Forums (www.tranceaddict.com/forums)
- Chill Out Room
-- Obesity Tax?
Pages (9): « 1 2 3 4 5 6 [7] 8 9 »

quote:

Originally posted by Arbiter If you are against this tax, then tell me which of the following statements you disagree with: 1. Government requires not insignificant amounts of money to fund. 2. Government could collect some portion of that money by taxing soft drink consumption 3. Taxing soft drink consumption provides people with an incentive to consume fewer soft drinks 4. There is a causal connection between soft drink consumption and obesity, or the extent thereof, in a non-negligible number of instances. 5. An incentive to consume fewer soft drinks thus provides an incentive to avoid or limit an activity that will causally contribute to obesity in a non-negligible number of instances. 6. That incentive has the potential to affect consumer behavior in at least some instances, and therefore has the potential to reduce the prevalence and/or extent of obesity relative to what they would otherwise be. 7. Obesity imposes a burden on society. 8. Less obesity imposes less of a burden on society. 9. An incentive that has the potential to result in a reduced burden on society is a potentially useful one. 10. A tax that creates a potentially useful incentive is preferable to one that does not. 11. Taxing income does not create a potentially useful incentive. 12. Therefore, taxing soft drink consumption is preferable to an income tax increase that would produce equivalent revenue. 13. Income taxes generating revenue in excess of the potential revenue that this tax may generate would still exist even if we eliminated all inefficient government expenditures. 14. Imposing this tax would thus reduce the necessary amount of income taxation by an amount roughly equal to the revenue of this tax, regardless of the efficiency of government expenditures. 15. Therefore, this tax is a good idea.

Wow, well said!

quote:

Originally posted by The17sss haha... you're an odd bird, Arbiter. Nicely laid out though. All true statements (Jerz the tax guru, can you confirm?). My beef is simply that I don't think the government should make those kinds of personal decisions. It can be a slippery slope

I see where you're coming from as well. It brings up the whole issue of "where will they draw the line?" Will they start taxing R-rated films because it contributes to some underlying societal issue, and to many people that might be a positive piece of legislation? Will they start taxing something else that another group sees as "dangerous".

However, for here and now, I think this tax is a good idea.

quote:

Originally posted by XaNaX yes but you don't turn into a 300 lbs human pig just because your metabolism is slow. if you had a slow metabolism you would either eat less or exercise to compensate or you would carry an extra 25 lbs. But you are not picking up an extra 150 lbs because of your metabolism, maybe in very rare cases because of some thyroid issues or something. If you really watch what someone who is morbidly obese eats over the course of an entire day you realize why they are that fat. I have seen this bitch who sits next to me literally wrap a stick of butter in a piece of bread and sit there and eat that well, in addition to the butter sandwich she does shit like if you are at lunch with her she orders something really small, I guess to make it look like she doesn't overeat. But then when she gets back to herself she will eat half a bag of oreos. god I have to stop thinking about that shit its making me sick

I agree here. Morbidly obese is not the same as having a slow metabolism and carrying around 20-30 extra pounds because of it. I get jealous of people who can eat non stop and not gain any weight, but at the same time if I maintain a decent diet with some exercise there is no way in hell I could ever get up to 300lbs and I'm a man. Fucking whale you have sitting there next to you.

quote:

Originally posted by The17sss haha... you're an odd bird, Arbiter. Nicely laid out though. All true statements (Jerz the tax guru, can you confirm?). My beef is simply that I don't think the government should make those kinds of personal decisions. It can be a slippery slope

That's a valid point considering the poor track record of government in general when it comes to these kind of fact-sensitive policy decisions.

At the same time, though, there's a risk either way: if government does nothing, then the heightened risk pool (here, heavy users of soft drinks who are more likely to have health problems) gets to force everyone else to pay for the consequences of their decisions.

I assume that you'd agree that it's better to deal with things like this through tax incentives than pure regulation, i.e. banning things that we think are bad. I think that tax schemes like this strike a nice middle ground, allocating part of the risk of a government foul-up to the people who partake in the activity in question, and part to the rest of society who don't want to pay the costs (actually or supposedly) caused by the activity. Obviously, government policy mistakes will be made, but -- at least in theory -- they should roughly balance out in the end, leaving the good decisions to do their job regarding incentives while also helping keep income tax lower, while the bad ones are still just consumption taxes (which if I'm not mistaken you'd prefer to income taxes anyway).

quote:

Originally posted by DJ Eco I see where you're coming from as well. It brings up the whole issue of "where will they draw the line?" Will they start taxing R-rated films because it contributes to some underlying societal issue, and to many people that might be a positive piece of legislation? Will they start taxing something else that another group sees as "dangerous". However, for here and now, I think this tax is a good idea.

yes, but they are also taxing G, PG, PG13 and R movies..

that damn parental guidance!

quote:

Originally posted by Arbiter I assume that you'd agree that it's better to deal with things like this through tax incentives than pure regulation, i.e. banning things that we think are bad. I think that tax schemes like this strike a nice middle ground, allocating part of the risk of a government foul-up to the people who partake in the activity in question, and part to the rest of society who don't want to pay the costs (actually or supposedly) caused by the activity. Obviously, government policy mistakes will be made, but -- at least in theory -- they should roughly balance out in the end, leaving the good decisions to do their job regarding incentives while also helping keep income tax lower, while the bad ones are still just consumption taxes (which if I'm not mistaken you'd prefer to income taxes anyway).

Yeah man, I have to agree with you.... it's much better to do it as a tax scheme than to simply ban things that an agenda driven government decides. And you're right, I prefer consumption taxes to income taxes all day.

It's really as easy as this: if you take in more calories than you burn you gain weight. point blank!!!

no one ever gained too much weight on a 2000-2500 calorie diet. either eat less shit or exercise more. it's not that difficult. fat fucks have an excuse for everything!

quote:

Originally posted by jerZ07002 It's really as easy as this: if you take in more calories than you burn you gain weight. point blank!!! no one ever gained too much weight on a 2000-2500 calorie diet. either eat less shit or exercise more. it's not that difficult. fat fucks have an excuse for everything!

This.

Plus there's no fucking medical condition that cause people to be morbidly obese. Not even hypothyroidism. Nice try, fatties.

quote:

Originally posted by jennypie Plus there's no fucking medical condition that cause people to be morbidly obese. Not even hypothyroidism. Nice try, fatties.

Then what causes it if there's no condition under which it is supposed to occur?

Lifestyle.

Is there a condition that causes patients to be obese? Morbidly obese is what, 100 pounds overweight or something?

No, there isn't.

quote:

Originally posted by jennypie Lifestyle.

But everyone has a lifestyle, why isn't everyone obese?

I thought it went without saying that we're talking about sedentary lifestyle. Don't get all sensitive now, fatty.

So then why are people sedentary?

You'd have to ask them that. I don't know why people aren't motivated to make healthy choices. Why are YOU fat?

jeff's answer is probably, so you can have something to talk about. then he'd fap to your intarwebtwins porn

Monkey-see, monkey-eat.

And I don't think I speak the language of most fat people - they tend to slur their speech to the form of some guttural breathing hardly audible over the flapping of their chins against their drooping cheeks. Wow, that was gross.

After thinking about it more, I'd have to take back my previous post. There are definitely factors that contribute to why people make unhealthy choices. Lack of education and low income are two big ones.

You can't take it back, it's too fucking late. I totally quoted it and everything. I didn't go through all that work just so you could take it back.

Haha sike! I was just making that stuff up!

FFFFFFFFFFFFFF-

Listen, I'll make it up to you. How would you like to go for some cheesecake?

To your credit though, you did specify that there weren't any actual medical conditions which directly contributed to morbid obesity, though I am sure you worded that considering of course that it can be a side effect of several of them.

However, I would consider the very nature of eating to understand reckless eating better - many people overeat quite often, even though they are not obese. It is merely a side-effect of our being reproductive beings who are biologically predisposed to walk around on land carrying our weight in self-contained organs and blood as well as reserves of fat to tide us over in lean times. People eat to stimulate this mammalian urge and it soon becomes a habit, an addiction of sorts, I'd venture. The general unhealthiness of many foods anymore as well as sedentary lifestyles certainly contribute, but obesity has always been a prospect of a minority in our species - so there is certainly a pretense - but the margin for its occurrence is growing smaller and smaller due to numerous other social and physiological factors inherent to everyday western lifestyles, especially.

But I'm pretty sure that's what you meant all along, I'm just now realizing it.

Powered by: vBulletin
Copyright © 2000-2021, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.