Philadelphia Soda Tax Leads To 30-50% Plunge In Sales, Mass Layoffs

Zero Hedge ^ | 02/22/2017

[lavaroise]

Next a black guy will be shot by police for smuggling soda and they will blame racism and guns for fake news, just like in NY. BLM will end up marching , of course, in fake support for blacks but actual effect of support for forcing people to pay taxes

[ltc8k6]

“The city predicted a 27 percent sales decline industry-wide”

[Alberta's Child]

If the owner of six Shop-Rite stores is laying off 300 workers over this tax, then it's not due to the loss of revenue from declining sales of soda. It's because the soda tax has chased people who used to shop in his stores to other stores outside the city -- where they now do ALL of their grocery shopping.

This is one of those idiotic laws that should stay on the books forever -- as a monument to the stupidity of the morons who passed it in the first place.

[fungoking]

“...they are not only passing the tax they should be paying onto their customer...”

I remember from jr hi economics that companies don't pay taxes, they collect them from their customers.

[TheNext]

By stock in home soda machines.

Like drug prohibition, the banned substance becomes concentrated. Sugar sweeteners for the machine will be smuggled.

[TheNext]

Added Sugar is the new Cigarette cancer.

[castlebrew]

Straight out of Atlas Shrugged

[Kid Shelleen]

**** Philly Metro Ping ****

The mayor and his toadies knew this was going to be an economic disaster. The ulterior motive was to get a Pre K program passed. They will simply tax something else or try and extort more money from Harrisburg and Washington.

[blueplum]

Any time the govt wants to tax a product or service ‘for healthier children,’ or ‘a healthier society,’ we might pause to remember how this city was licking its lips in anticipation of a new revenue stream - that wouldn’t have been spent on anything remotely related to ‘children’.

[Reeses]

The power to tax is the power to destroy.

Which is why we should vote to allow big city rat nests unlimited tax and regulation power within city limits. That is equivalent to nuking them.

[Buckeye McFrog]

...and John Galt makes his appearance

[HamiltonJay]

Exactly, and its in the article that sales are down on more than just soda...

[Prov1322]

Cheapest way to get out of Jersey by car is on the Tacony-Palmyra with a $4.00 toll. $5.00 on the other bridges.

Grew up just blocks from the Tacony-Palmyra when it was a 5 cent toll (the Ben Franklin and Walt Whitman were 25 cents). Traffic in our area was always fun on Friday and Sunday nights with the shore traffic flowing to and from. Fond memories of actually walking across the bridge as a kid.

[Antoninus]

This tax was put into place by an arch Democrat on his largely Democrat constituency. It is the ultimate in regressive taxation, hitting the poor and working class especially hard.

But remember, the Democrats are the part of the "little guy"...

[SaveFerris]

Soda tax is the most stupid idea since outlawing 32oz cups.

Reducing potion size by force does not solve obesity. You can buy a 2-liter on sale for 78 cents or less (grocery store sale this week).

[SaveFerris]

[You can’t fix stupid....]

2008 and 2012 certainly proved that. And most of them went for Hillary in 2016.

[maxwellsmart_agent]

This is the way democrats do things. Seeing the results of the soda tax, they will look for someplace else to tax to make up for the goof. They will never admit it was a mistake and recind it. That would be saying they were wrong which they will never do.

[FamiliarFace]

Loved this: “I didn’t think it was possible for the soda industry to be any greedier,” Kenney said in an emailed statement.

What a hypocrite!

[huldah1776]

Boy I got out of the suburbs just in time (moved to NC). It was bad enough having people from Trenton come over just to get tax free groceries.

[Some Fat Guy in L.A.]

The Law of Unintended Consequences rears its head again. Convenience stores make most of their profit selling soda and beer, so will no doubt put a bunch of them out of business (though not sure you can buy beer in a convenience store in PA - couldn’t when I lived there years ago).