I have to admit, when I saw this headline about a city attempting to curtail all sugary drinks in municipal offices, my immediate guess was San Francisco. So congratulations, Boston! You surprised me.
I support instituting taxes to increase the cost of food products with harmful health impacts. Taxes on alcohol, cigarettes, gambling and other activities with public safety or public health implications are widely accepted. Capturing the cost of those societal externalities is good public policy.
But this sort of heavy handed attempt to control people's choices - especially when done by a public employer - is exactly the kind of awful policy that partially validates conservative claims that liberals want to introduce a nanny state.
No comments:
Post a Comment