Healthy Government

With recent talk of a "soda tax" in Philadelphia and pundits warnings/support of further government intervention in American dietary habits due to its increased place in health care, I've been thinking a lot about F. D. Roosevelt and one of his pets, the Agricultural Act of 1938. Why is that?

The more one begins to perceive the workings of our government, the more one sees plain as day the complete philosophical bankruptcy of our leaders. Our politicians meander through life as jackals preying on the public and working to fatten the purses of themselves and a few close friends. Our government shows no consistency and frequently outrightly contradicts itself.

Although taxation as a means to curtail undesirable behavior should be recognized as evil and a hallmark of despotism in itself, such goals are too lofty at this stage. However, most can probably agree that government should not jointly penalize unhealthy behavior in one domain and subsidize it in another. Unfortunately government has been partly doing this for years.

Ever walk around the supermarket and wonder why all the cheapest items are so bad for you? You can get an economy sized pack of fudge cookies for the same price as a bunch of bananas. This stems largely from governmental policy. Junk food consists mostly of sugar which is dirt cheap in our country. But raw unprocessed sugar has a hefty tariff imposed on it (not for any health reasons only to protect inefficient domestic producers), so these sweet products are produced using High Fructose Corn Syrup.

This brings us back to FDR and his cronies Henry Wallace and Rexford Tugwell. Passed under the guise of relief (somehow farmer prosperity and farm prices were linked to overall economic health in a series of poorly manufactured causal chains) the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 included federal subsidies for six "basic crops": corn, wheat, tobacco, cotton, rice, and peanuts. In reality the bill was a payoff to huge farm lobby in return for political support. As Economist Donald Paarlberg explains,

"The top 1% of farmers got 21% of the benefits. ... Left out of the program were more than 100 other crops... More, in fact, was left out than was included. The politically influential basic crops produced only about 20% of the industry's income but received 75% of the program benefits."

Relief indeed. This farm bill continues until this present day with benefits being renewed every 4 years without much debate. Notice the content of those basic crops? Not exactly the health conscious person's preferred list of goods. Just looking at recipients of the subsidies in PA we have some startling numbers. In 2009, only 28% of PA farmers collected any form of farm subsidy. In addition, 10% of our state's farmers collected 58% of the subsidies totaling 868 million since 1995.

Corn subsidies in that time frame? 640 million good for the top spot of all subsidies received. In the top 10 there's not all that much I can say promotes good obesity fighting health. Soybeans totaled 96 million and apples 12 million some 17% of the corn expenditures.

So before we talk about a "soda tax" maybe we should talk about subsidies. These expenditures are not necessary and subsidize unhealthy eating. Of course most politicians lack the logic to see the problem in pursuing both courses of action. And any plea to a common health argument is all smoke and mirrors meant as a feeble justification for any new gorging scheme our benefactors intend to impose on us.

(As a side note some studies suggest that HFCS may contribute to increased appetites and body fat compared to sugar. The jury seems to still be out, but it's worth noting)

Cafeteria Greenery

When I'm in the cafeteria I enjoy having the luxury of using a tray to carry my various plates and drinks to my seat. However this decadent luxury has been revoked by the fine people at Aramark for the unassailable reason of saving the environment. Naturally given their intentions I have no grounds upon which no complain, and no argument to offer against their noble crusade. As napkin holders tell us (now housing 100% dye free recycled napkins) not having trays allows us to save the environment by saving water and soap while reducing food waste caused by trays. The fact that trays cause food waste is undeniable as shown by objective statistics compiled by Aramark using the grand sample of one day of food waste from our University (details such as the control, data gathering process, etc are unnecessary). And the atrocious wasting of non-replenish-able natural resources such as soap and water speak for themselves.

Who believes this facade? Without even trying to compare the inconvenience of making four trips just have a meal with the carbon footprint associated with washing a 18"x 12" piece of plastic, can anyone take this seriously? This whole ploy, like most "green movements", is just designed to save money and not doing a damn thing for the environment. If the company could just be upfront and say "We're cutting simple commodities in an attempt to reduce costs and keep prices fixed.", I would actually respect their decision. As it is I'm just annoyed. Even if they were telling the truth, the result would be a negative one. If research would be spent on more reasonable things, eventually technological advances will come along which will lead to safer environmental practices. Look at Poland Spring. In attempt to reduced costs they find an optimized design for their water bottles which maximizes volume while minimizing surface area. As a result their bottles use less plastic. Here we see a technological advancement helping the environment, while providing no discomfort to the consumer. Aramark removes trays, slightly improving the environment, and greatly annoying the consumer.

Politicians and Their Logic

I was reading a LA Times article today published after the ratification of the sixteenth amendment and I came across a quote I just had to share with the nobody people who will read this. This piece of wisdom comes from long former Tennessee representative Cordell Hull:

"One of the important results on an income tax will be a curbing of unnecessary federal expenditures. When a great part of a government's income is derived by direct tax upon the citizens of the nation, they will scrutinize more carefully the appropriations made by congress."

To which of course the only appropriate response is lol or perhaps a rofl. Now I don't believe that Hull actually spoke such absurd words truly meaning them; I'm sure he was giving his best Billy Mays to the public trying to push ratification. Apparently he did a good job making people think giving a government more power as a means to curtail power is a good idea. Given America's mental dependence on the federal income tax as a sacrosanct, eternal fixture of our law, it seems the idea really took.

Of course the amendment was a long time coming after the tax's first "necessary" establishment during the Civil War, but still that idea that all but 6 of the then 48 states voted for ratification a mere 137 years after the revolution amazes me.

What bothers me the most is how anyone who attempts to bring the morality or necessity of the federal income tax into public debate is automatically labeled a nutcase and instantly discredited. How did we come so far?