Seattle — In this city, which is a petri dish of progressivism, a prevailing theory is that when you raise the price of something, people will buy less of it, except when they do not. Another, and related, theory is that constitutional and statutory texts should be construed in the spirit of Friedrich Nietzsche: There are no facts, only interpretations. The city council has voted to impose a tax, effective next year, on sugary soft drinks, raising the price of a 2-liter bottle of soda about $1.18.
Presented as a public-health measure to combat obesity, the tax is projected to generate about $15 million a year, although the aspiration of sin taxes (e.g., Seattle’s taxes on guns and ammunition) should be zero revenues because chastened consumers will mend their benighted ways. Still, proponents of the tax are confident that it will make people behave better by consuming less of the disapproved drinks.
Read more at:
https://www.nationalreview.com/article/451890/seattles-city-council-minimum-wage-income-tax-sugary-drink-tax-interpretations
