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**lammaredder** · 08-05-2012, 08:28 AM

Again, look at the lottery. In Florida they say the tax revenue collected from it is responsible for paying out "Billions" in education. In reality, all they did was take the previously allotted money and spent it elsewhere. The lottery funding simply replaced the hole, and didn't improve a goddamn thing. Sin taxes will be no different.

That's more the fault of corrupt Floridian lawmakers. And you can apply the same scenerio to your proposal to increase education. There's no guarantee increasing the education budget will increase health ed. Not when the bulk of it goes towards prep for standardized testing, math, and science.

In my proposals, fast food tax revenues would go toward creating new programs and not expanding old ones. While I'm all for improving education, we already spend an enormous sum on secondary education, spending more isn't going to put a dent in the obesity rate. Republican-led cuts on higher education primarily targeted universities--after all, you can't have an educated public as they'd never vote Republican--not primary and high school where health education is most effective.

Well there you go. In one instance you claim government taxation and regulation will improve eating habits, but then you blame the government and their public schools for their failure to educate.

No, it is far simpler to regulate certain fast foods, for instance, than it is to educate the public and change attitudes on healthy eating. Here's just a few reasons why:

1. It's the culture, stupid. There's a reason why you seldom encounter obese asians, but obesity is rampant among latinos and blacks. You can tell people until you're blue in the face that their eating habits will kill them, but so long as their culture glorifies eating crappy food, they're still going to want their bucket of extra-crispy Popeyes fried drumsticks.

2. Humans are weak. Just because you know something is good for you doesn't mean you'll do it. It's why so few people stick to new year's resolutions. Most people already know eating fatty, fried food isn't good for you; they do it anyway because it's cheap, readily available, and they've been conditioned to think it tastes good.

3. Suburbs. It's been shown that people who live in cities are healthier and live longer than those who reside in suburbs, yet America is littered with inefficient suburban housing. It's bad enough most Americans don't exercise, but encouraging them to drive everywhere isn't helping. Forget cutting subsidies to farmers. If you want to reduce obesity, stop subsidizing suburban housing and non-urban roads.

4. There will always be a large class of stupid Americans immune to education. Americans excel at stupidity, and while it's honorable to think we can fix this problem with a top tier education system, you're still going to be left with millions of uneducated, poor, fatassed consumers.

You're really only advocating more of the status quo. Face it, forcing every student to eat a health lunch would do more good than forcing students to listen to yet another lecture on good nutrition. In fact, I'm going to add another point to my proposal to reduce obesity:

7. Have the US government close every overseas American-owned fast food restaurant.

It's bad enough fast-food is poisoning America, now we spread it across the globe. Kuwait is the second most obese nation in the world after the US. Guess why.

08-05-2012, 08:28 AM	#28
lammaredder Join Date Nov 2005 Posts 405 Senior Member	Again, look at the lottery. In Florida they say the tax revenue collected from it is responsible for paying out "Billions" in education. In reality, all they did was take the previously allotted money and spent it elsewhere. The lottery funding simply replaced the hole, and didn't improve a goddamn thing. Sin taxes will be no different. That's more the fault of corrupt Floridian lawmakers. And you can apply the same scenerio to your proposal to increase education. There's no guarantee increasing the education budget will increase health ed. Not when the bulk of it goes towards prep for standardized testing, math, and science. In my proposals, fast food tax revenues would go toward creating new programs and not expanding old ones. While I'm all for improving education, we already spend an enormous sum on secondary education, spending more isn't going to put a dent in the obesity rate. Republican-led cuts on higher education primarily targeted universities--after all, you can't have an educated public as they'd never vote Republican--not primary and high school where health education is most effective. Well there you go. In one instance you claim government taxation and regulation will improve eating habits, but then you blame the government and their public schools for their failure to educate. No, it is far simpler to regulate certain fast foods, for instance, than it is to educate the public and change attitudes on healthy eating. Here's just a few reasons why: 1. It's the culture, stupid. There's a reason why you seldom encounter obese asians, but obesity is rampant among latinos and blacks. You can tell people until you're blue in the face that their eating habits will kill them, but so long as their culture glorifies eating crappy food, they're still going to want their bucket of extra-crispy Popeyes fried drumsticks. 2. Humans are weak. Just because you know something is good for you doesn't mean you'll do it. It's why so few people stick to new year's resolutions. Most people already know eating fatty, fried food isn't good for you; they do it anyway because it's cheap, readily available, and they've been conditioned to think it tastes good. 3. Suburbs. It's been shown that people who live in cities are healthier and live longer than those who reside in suburbs, yet America is littered with inefficient suburban housing. It's bad enough most Americans don't exercise, but encouraging them to drive everywhere isn't helping. Forget cutting subsidies to farmers. If you want to reduce obesity, stop subsidizing suburban housing and non-urban roads. 4. There will always be a large class of stupid Americans immune to education. Americans excel at stupidity, and while it's honorable to think we can fix this problem with a top tier education system, you're still going to be left with millions of uneducated, poor, fatassed consumers. You're really only advocating more of the status quo. Face it, forcing every student to eat a health lunch would do more good than forcing students to listen to yet another lecture on good nutrition. In fact, I'm going to add another point to my proposal to reduce obesity: 7. Have the US government close every overseas American-owned fast food restaurant. It's bad enough fast-food is poisoning America, now we spread it across the globe. Kuwait is the second most obese nation in the world after the US. Guess why.
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