We are more obese as a nation than we have ever been, despite significant research and media focused on the obesity epidemic over the past two decades. Sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) taxes, one topic in the spotlight, have repeatedly been shown to reduce SSB purchasing,1 including in Cook County, Illinois, where taxed beverage sales declined by more than 20% during its tax.2 Between 2015 and 2017, eight jurisdictions in the United States enacted SSB taxes. However, in the three years since, no new taxes have been enacted and four states have preempted any new local SSB taxes, including California (home to four local SSB taxes) and Washington. What has stymied the important progress we were making?
展开▼
