Increasing taxes on low income earners is only going to make them poorer and sicker.

The article is literally about how a study found a tax on sugary drinks "could prevent 3.7 million cases of tooth decay, 191,000 cases of gum disease, and 115,000 cases of complete tooth loss across Australia over the next 25 years."

That's people being less sick.

I'd also note that making people less sick also makes them less poor, because they don't have to pay the cost of dental and other health care (yes, it should be free, but it's not)

If revenue raised by the tax is used to provide services to low income earners - e.g. subsidised dental care, subsidised fresh food - then low income earners could come out ahead.

The theory goes, If packaged junk food was more expensive then people would eat healthier packaged food. A tax on sugary drinks and a cap on bottled water prices is along those same lines.

It's not proposed as a revenue raiser, it's intended as a public health measure.

The idea is that people buy less sugary drinks and have better dental health.

Your concerns raise a valid point, though, that revenue raised (and $1.4B isn't nothing) should be directly funneled into new programmes that benefit the working class. The study suggests that the money go into dental and other health services, but I've also seen proposals for using the revenue to cross-subsidise fresh food.

Either way, the working class could see a net benefit to their bottom line from government subsidies (which benefit from efficiencies of scale) and because they'll have less need of dental and other health services if they reduce their sugar intake.

But sweet, carbonated beverages (on the shelf; the refrigerated bottles are kinda expensive) are one of the last, somewhat inexpensive products in supermarkets.

That's exactly the problem it's intended to address. It's cheap to buy, and expensive in its consequences.

I've seen it proposed that revenue from such a tax be used to subsidise fresh food, so that's another option that would double the nudge towards healthier options while being hip-pocket-neutral for shoppers (the devil is always in the detail, of course).

Nah, these always go into general revenue. End up in the hands of KPMG, some politician's family child care, job seeker business, or a religious enterprise. Can't have free dental because we have to buy submarines that won't be delivered so we can have a war with our biggest trading partner.

Yay, more sugar alcohols causing allergies, stomach cramps and the shits. Millions of people suffering reduced productivity and lower life quality. But we got to punish the poor/fat people for being poor/fat.

I've always believed that just like some people hate coriander (cilantro), some people hate certain sweeteners. Like it's a genetic thing where they can taste things others cannot. Most people I speak to seem to enjoy Stevia and Aspartame for some reason, but I can't stand it

Taking glucose-fructose out of drinks and replacing with sweeteners accomplishes nothing. The rush of insulin starts from the sensation of sweetness, before blood glucose levels spike. The brain signals the pancreas to be ready.

The US switched to sweeteners and diabetes rates skyrocketed decades after. The actual safety of amino acid analogs is still suspect but it's a massive industry corrupt with governments.

What needs to be regulated is the bliss point of how much sweetness is allowed in drinks, and to tax sweet drinks, including juices and use the money to subsidize flavored fizzy waters with no sweetness, and just water. It is INSANE what we allow Nestle to charge for water.

The levy as outlined in the article, as @[email protected] pointed out, is intended to be passed on to the consumer, with the price increase causing people to consume fewer sugary drinks. If they didn't pass it on, it would have no effect on dental health.

From the article:

Assuming a 20 per cent tax is passed on in full to consumers, the study predicted the price increase would result in a 24 per cent reduction in consumption.

However, there are ways you can design a policy like this to reduce the cost to consumers while still having an effect on dental health. In the UK, their levy is only applied to a drink "if it contains at least 5 grams (g) of sugar per 100 millilitres (ml) in its ready to drink or diluted form." As as result, the UK soft drink industry reformulated their drinks to fall below that amount (often by partially substituting non-sugar sweeteners) so that they wouldn't have to pay the tax at all and they wouldn't need to pass it on to consumers or absorb it.

From the article:

In 2018, the United Kingdom introduced a tax of 19.4 or 25.9 pence per litre, depending on the sugar content of beverages.

It led to a 46 per cent reduction in the sugar contained in soft drinks, the UK government said, with nearly 90 per cent of the market now containing sugar below the level at which the tax applies.

The study (https://bmjpublichealth.bmj.com/content/4/3/e002110) actually modelled the effect of reformulation, too:

To explore the impact of possible industry responses, we also modelled product reformulation scenarios with 50% and 100% sugar reductions (and no consumer response) and 50% and 80% pass through scenarios.

The health impact of the SSB tax is up to three times larger with 50% reformulation as compared with the base case and nearly five times with 100% reformulation.

Since the UK's policy has resulted in a 46% reformulation, we have a clear real-world template for bringing about a 50% reformulation and the health benefits that would accompany it.

I think passing it on to consumers is an assumed part of the idea; discouraging people from consuming drinks with added sugar, and thus discouraging companies from making and marketing such drinks.