(KJM-427/Flickr)
Both San Francisco and Berkeley have measures on their November ballots that would institute a tax on sugar-sweetened beverages. With less than a week to go until Election Day, we’re getting down to the nitty-gritty. People want to know exactly what will be taxed — and what won’t.
First things first: The tax is on sugar-sweetened beverages, so diet sodas would not be taxed. After all, they do not have sugar or any other sweetener that has calories. Maybe the moniker “soda tax” is misleading here.
To find out if your favorite beverage would be taxed, ask yourself the following:
- Does this drink contain added sugar (or another caloric sweetener such as high-fructose corn syrup)?
- Does this drink have significant nutritional value (such as, say, milk does)?
If you answer “yes” to the first question and “no” to the second, your beverage is most likely subject to the proposed tax.
Here are drinks that are subject to the tax (farther down are exempt drinks):
(Kaleb Fulgham/Flickr)
Sodas — such as regular Coke, Pepsi, 7 Up, etc. (But not diet sodas.) This includes sodas in bottles and cans, as well as fountain drinks. Both the Berkeley and San Francisco measures call for taxing the syrup used to make fountain drinks. The syrup is taxed according to the largest volume, in fluid ounces, that could be produced from the sugar-sweetened syrup. For example, if a distributor sells a 12-ounce bottle of syrup and that syrup can be used to make 144 ounces of beverage, the tax is levied on the 144 ounces of beverage. Continue reading →