STUMP » Articles » More Soda Tax Idiocy: This Time, It's Seattle » 6 January 2018, 14:43

Where Stu & MP spout off about everything.

More Soda Tax Idiocy: This Time, It's Seattle  

by

6 January 2018, 14:43

Look, Cook County is not the only place that has thought of a soda tax. They just had an awful operational aspect… on top of it being higher than booze taxes. And really stupid explanations.

Well, guess who hasn’t learned from others’ mistakes?

SEATTLE: WE DIDN’T THINK HIGHER TAXES WOULD END UP AS HIGHER PRICES

Taxes and profit margins: how do they work?

This initial heads-up is thanks to Twitchy, which tends to have its finger on the pulse of stupidity.


Okay, 1.75 cents per ounce.

What was the Cook County Soda Tax?

1 cent per ounce.

via GIPHY


So, you were going to impose a tax even bigger than the one in Cook County, Illinois, and you thought that prices wouldn’t move?

Is that the explanation you’re gonna go with?

via GIPHY

WE INTERRUPT THIS BLOG POST FOR AN OFFICIAL MESSAGE

This is what I’m seeing on the Seattle govt page on the soda tax:

SWEETENED BEVERAGE TAX
Beginning Jan. 1, 2018, the City of Seattle will impose a sweetened beverage tax. View Ordinance 125324.

The sweetened beverage tax is a tax on the distribution of sweetened beverages in the city of Seattle. The tax is collected on the final distribution of sweetened beverages by a distributor. The tax is not collected by the retailer nor is the tax burden intended to fall onto the consumer. The intent of the sweetened beverage tax is to tax the distributions of sweetened beverages into Seattle for retail sale in Seattle.

For more information, please review:

Sweetened beverage tax frequently asked questions
Seattle business tax rule 5-953 (includes illustrative examples for distributors, restaurants and grocery stores)
Seattle Municipal Code Chapter 5.53 If you have questions or concerns, contact SweetenedBevTax@seattle.gov.

Tax rate

The standard tax rate for the sweetened beverage tax is $.0175 per ounce. There is a reduced tax rate for certified manufacturers. That rate is $.01 per ounce.

Well, what exactly is the intention?

Is it in the official ordinance?

I found a page full of WHEREASes, which is generally where one finds the asses, and it’s a bit tiresome. I will screenshot a few, because the dang PDF is not encoded properly.

WHEREAS set 1:

WHEREAS set 2:

(it keeps going on like this for some more WHEREASes)

The ultimate THEREFORE:

TWITTER REACTION

Here we go.







I suppose they thought decades of crappy public schooling would lead to the result of taxpayers not understanding a cause-effect chain (politicians may or may not understand said chain, but they seem to think that others don’t get it). But at some point, it’s just pathetic.

Here’s a whole chain on realizing that the pols are plain lying and assuming people will buy it:




Doesn’t really matter if they’re lying or just stupid themselves.

So.

I guess we’re doing this soda tax thing again.


Yay.


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