Shared Family Mealtime

Leading Causes of Overweight in Children

Inappropriate eating habits
Skipping breakfast and overeating later
High fat, sugar, and sodium content in snacks and meals
Sugar-sweetened beverages
Eating out and meals on the go
Decrease in “family meal time”
Lack of consistent meal times
Inappropriate serving sizes (super sizing)

Problem: Trends in Beverages Consumption

Sugar-sweetened beverages: drinks sweetened with sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, or other caloric sweeteners Between 1977 and 2001, consumption of carbonated soda rose 137%.

Policy: Taxes on Sugar Sweetened Beverages

[Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity, 2012]

2 Goals:

Raising revenue
Changing consumption

A national tax of a penny per ounce on SSBs would generate approximately $13 billion in 2013 alone.

What Kind of Tax?

Excise Tax
- Advantages: generates stable revenue, can be imposed at distribution level
- Disadvantage: Difficult to impose on local level
Sales Tax

Should diet or lite beverages be taxed?

Problem: Food/Beverage Marketing Targeting Children

For all families, regardless of economic status, food marketing has become a problem, with food of little to no nutritional value being advertised to specifically appeal to children. Present advertising tactics have been criticized as predatory, and ingredient-labeling practices of companies have been discovered to be deceptive.

Policy: Children’s Food & Beverage Advertising Initiative

This is a voluntary self-regulation program designed to shift the mix of foods advertised to children under 12 to encourage healthier dietary choices and healthy lifestyles.