Jamie Oliver has said the millions being raised through the so-called sugar tax should be used to extend the provision of free school meals.
Repeat after me – we do not hypothecate taxes.
The sugar tax might be a damn fool idea. Free school meals could be a good one – or a damn fool one.
But there is no connection – absolutely none, nada, zilch or zip – between how much we can raise in tax revenue from a sugar tax and how much we should be spending upon free school meals.
So, we don’t do that then.
Think on it just for a moment. Imagine that the sugar tax works, in the sense that lots of people give up eating sugar. Tax revenue falls. So, we want to spend less on free school meals now, do we?
Quite, it’s idiocy.
Think on it just for a moment. Imagine that the sugar tax works, in the sense that lots of people give up eating sugar. Tax revenue falls. So, we want to spend less on free school meals now, do we?
Tax revenues fall from one source means that the government will just put taxes up somewhere else in an attempt to make up the shortfall.
Government never reduces spending
I’m old enough to remember when feeding your own children was the parents’ job.
Tim. And still you think a carbon tax is a good idea….
Isn’t this true of any tax? Even income tax is often blamed for hindering ambition and ultimately tax revenue. At the extreme, of course.
Make Rashford pay for them.
Jamie Oliver has always been an idiot. Why expect any different now?
Gurning Mockney advises about nutrition.
Check his recipes instead of his words – they are mostly full of so-called ‘unhealthy’ ingredients, including sugar.
We have a hypothecated fuel surcharge which goes to find public transport.
So cost of fuel goes up people buy less and tax take goes down, at the same time use of public transport and their costs (fuel being a substantial one) goes up, so revenue down/costs up.
Due to govt regulations the public transit authority is also prevented from entering into hedging agreements for bulk fuel supplies so increases hit straight away.
It’s going to be interesting to see what post Covid hybrid working does to transit capacity planning as it’s going to lead to much more variable demand
Jamie Oliver + actual food = syntax error.
I read the headline as:
sugar tax should be used to extend the provision of school ready meals.
Possibly a good idea – the adults eat less sugar, then the little ones also suffer.
Far simpler though to just stop subsidising sugar (i mean all food) production in the first place, equalise food VAT with other consumption, and let the markets and parental preferences for healthy kids sort itself out.
Er, did anyone read the article? I don’t think it had anything to do with hypothecating taxes.
The headline called for hypothocated taxation, couldn’t be bothered to read the article to see if the content agreed.
https://www.itv.com/news/2021-05-21/marcus-rashford-tops-sunday-times-giving-list-in-record-breaking-year-for-donors
There is a difference between raising money for charity and actually donating your own. Details of how much of Marcus Rashfords personal fortune has actually been given away are thin on the ground although in his defence he has never used the Sir Geldof “I give my fecking time” excuse.
@bis
“And still you think a carbon tax is a good idea….”
That’s not a hypothecated tax, it’s a Pigou tax (ie taxing a “bad” so that people incentives now internalise a negative externality). Politicians might (indeed, inevitably will) mess around with a Pigou tax. But it still beats failure to address those externalities, and doesn’t have a direct link to spending decisions, which is Tommy’s point.
they aren’t “free”! And wasn’t it Oliver who demonstrated the poor nutritional content?
Tsk, Tim, every fule kno you just give children meals for free, then tax sugar to prevent inflation going up.