About the sugar tax has been debated for a long time in Finland and elsewhere in the world. According to a recent study, it has fulfilled its mission, at least for soft drinks in the United States.
In five large cities, the sale of sugary drinks has decreased significantly thanks to the tax, he says research report In Jama Health Forum scientific journal. The change seems permanent.
According to the researchers, the result is further evidence that health taxes work. They estimate that adjusting the tax would pay off on a wider scale.
Finland decided in the last term of government to gradually increase the taxation of sugar-sweetened soft drinks. After confirmation by the European Commission, the amount of the tax will be 16–48 cents per liter, depending on the amount of added sugar.
Also in the cities of Philadelphia, Seattle, San Francisco, Oakland and Boulder, which were the subject of the US study, the tax is paid, depending on the amount of sugar in the drink, between 34 and 65 cents per liter.
The prices of sugar-sweetened soft drinks rose by 33 percent in cities due to the tax. Their sales fell by the same amount, 33 percent.
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Even in Finland, the tax increase on sugary drinks clearly reduced their consumption.
But did they move consumers to buy their sugar lemonade cheaper elsewhere?
A previous study found that the sugar tax significantly reduced sales in the city of Philadelphia, but at the same time sales turned to increase in the surrounding area.
The conclusion was that people shopped elsewhere to avoid the tax.
In a new study, a professor of economics Scott Kaplan and his research colleagues found no signs of shopping trips to the tax-free zone.
Also in Finland the tax increase on sugary drinks in 2014 clearly reduced their consumption.
The Research Institute for Wage Earners concluded in his research the decisive factor was that cheaper sugar-free alternatives were available.
The candy tax, on the other hand, did not reduce candy sales.
Fresh lead study author Kaplan says in the US NPR news service that a quarter of the added sugar in the diet of the country's adults comes from sugar sodas.
Eating too much sugar is unhealthy in many ways. It is connected to obesity, diabetes, heart disease and tooth decay, among other things. The aim of the tax is to reduce sugar consumption.
When a few major US cities enacted a tax on sugary sodas a decade ago, the soft drink industry poured millions of dollars into opposing the tax.
of the United States the Soft Drink Industry Association tells NPR that it is now working to provide consumers with low-sugar options.
According to the association, the strategy is working: almost 60 percent of drinks sold in the United States are sugar-free, and people are getting fewer calories from soft drinks than in decades.
Nevertheless, the association continued to emphasize in its statement that the tax is dysfunctional and harmful to consumers.
Published in Tiede magazine 2/2024.
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