01-14-2022, 12:18 AM
(01-13-2022, 09:42 AM)danbrotherston Wrote: FWIW, As you all know, I think it's a smart policy, economic incentives are an effective way to encourage behaviour we want. We *DO* tax cigarettes and alcohol.
FWIW:
We don't tax extra in junk food, so we end up with obese people in the hospital for various reason: knee replacements, quadruple by-pass surgeries, etc.
We don't tax people who play extreme sports (that would include things like hockey, football, etc). These same people also wind up with knee replacements, concussions, and broken internal organs.
We don't tax people who drink and drive, who speed, who run stop signs, red lights, etc. They cause accidents, they cause injuries, they cause deaths.
We also don't tax jaywalkers, or any pedestrian, or cyclists, who disobeys signs.
As for alcohol: there are 4 types of drinkers: 1) social drinkers, who are responsible when it comes to alcohol and pose little risk to our healthcare, and contribute little in alcohol tax 2) regular drinkers -- the 1 or 2 drinks a day, 3 or 4 times a week. Likewise, they pay little tax, and post moderate risk, 3) alcoholics - they drink every day, sometimes 1 drink, sometimes 10 drinkers. Some of these folks will pose a serious risk out our healthcare. But, arguably, they have paid $1,000 - $2,000/year in SIN tax -- not enough to cover, but hey. 4) Drunks - they are occasional drinkers that can't control themselves. Example is the Ezra street party, kids drinking 40oz of whiskey and passing out almost dead. They folks quite often pay very little in SIN tax, but the risk to our healthcare is extreme. $24 taxes on a 40oz bottle doesn't cover the costs of one of these folks ending up in the hospital.
So -- if someone comes into the hospital passed out from alcohol, they need to be charged a premium as well.
Perhaps giving people economical financial incentives to to get drunk, not to eat McDonalds and Doritos, etc, extra tax on semi professional sports and professional and amateur sports. A tax on everything that could contribute to your earlier visit to the ER.
We do that. We're onto something then.