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Comment by eggpy | Hacker News Reader

That's not true. Here's just one example: fine-grained taxes are used to help influence behavior, improving public health. Mexico increased taxes on sugar [0], with the result being a fall in consumption. Raising this tax has caused a verifiable reduction in consumption, which has a direct impact on public health[1]. That's just one example, many more exist for all sorts of reasons. It's why cigarettes and alcohol are taxed differently than broccoli. Obviously not all taxes are in the public interest, but neither are they just to give some government official a feeling of empowerment.

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/feb/22/mexico-sugar...

[1] http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal....

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Many people believe this is an overstep on the government's part. These people believe it's not the government's job to be paternalistic and nudge people into the "right direction".

This is based on the complete abhorrence of "scope creep" mixed with near total surveillance and control over the use of force. Those with that much power should not be able to enforce social mores, even if they reflect the will of the people at the time.

>Those with that much power should not be able to enforce social mores, even if they reflect the will of the people at the time.

What else are laws for?

What if we frame it as a financial problem, not a well-being problem. Argument: it is in everyone's best interest if fewer people smoke. Smoking overwhelmingly affects poorer citizens who are already more reliant on social services. And since effects are tied to age, older smokers will more heavily put a burden on both the healthcare system as well as the entire insurance market (including Medicare/ Medicaid). Ergo it is in everyones best interest to disincentivize as many people from smoking as possible. Raising a tax on cigarettes is a cheap, quick, and effective means to do so, while raising funds for the very same health services they are likely to be using in the future.

Give people social services, and now you own them and have the right to control their life.

Ah so that's why in the US you get health insurance from your employer!

However in a democracy those people are merely one constituency among the electorate, the rest of whom like to have things like police forces, emergency response services, shared infrastructure such as road networks, enforced assurances of the quality of consumer goods and services and many other things that a well funded government can provide. Unfortunately that funding has to come from somewhere and making choices about where the funds come from requires making judgements on such things.

Sugar consumption isn't contagious. I would call that an improvement to private health.

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