Connecticut Fights for the First State-Wide Sugar Tax

From Berkeley to Seattle to Philadelphia, sugar taxes on sodas and other sweetened beverages have been cropping up in cities around the country as municipalities struggle to improve public health. Local governments, beset by high rates of obesity and obesity-related diseases, have had to fight against the massive beverage industry lobby as they push to hold sugary drinks accountable for the havoc they wreak.

Much of the lobbying against such taxes, however, has been at the state level, aimed at getting legislatures to pass preemptive laws that would stop local governments from taking action. As a result, not a single state in the country has yet managed to push through one of these taxes. Connecticut governor Ned Lamont is looking to change that. If Lamont has his way, his state will become the first to grab the soda industry by the horns.

Soda lobby rears its ugly head

In his budget proposal for the year, Lamont added a tax of 1.5 cents per ounce on sugary drinks. The move has set off a firestorm among soda industry representatives bent on the killing the proposal in the state congress. “The industry lobbying is going to be pretty ferocious. I don’t know if the legislature can stand up to it,” said Lamont, daring representatives to take action.¹

The pushback from big soda has already begun. A site devoted to stopping the tax says that lawmakers shouldn’t be raising “grocery bills” for Connecticut citizens, a euphemism that’s been used across the country by the lobby to make their cause seem more aligned with the interests of ordinary people.² An organization called “Yes! To Affordable Groceries” pushes the same line for the soda industry in fights with state and local governments nationwide, in an attempt to make the issue appear broader than it actually is.

Experts agree: a sugar tax is the best solution for the crisis

Luckily, it is up to health experts and not interested corporations to set the record straight on sweetened beverages and their direct impact on the national obesity epidemic. At the end of March, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Heart Association issued a joint statement calling on states to implement exactly the kind of tax being proposed by Governor Lamont. Dr. Sandra Carbonari, the medical director of the Connecticut chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said that a tax was the most cost-effective way to get children, and parents for that matter, to cut down on harmful sodas and sugary drinks. The money, she said, should be reinvested in educational programs designed to raise awareness at an early age on the harms of too much sugar.³

In the face of powerful opposition, it’s definitely an uphill battle for politicians like Lamont. But as taxes spread from city to city, it seems to be just a matter of time before state governments get their acts together and crack down on big soda.

Dr. Rosmy Barrios, MD

This article has been medically reviewed by Dr. Rosmy Barrios, MD.

Dr. Rosmy Barrios, MD is an aesthetic medicine specialist whose work focuses on patients who are treated for obesity, metabolic syndrome, and other weight-related issues through nutritional analysis, keto diet programs, and supporting medications.

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Ryan Mernin

Ryan is a freelance writer and editor based in Philadelphia. He has edited books of Chinese philosophy, interviewed bands as a music journalist, and labored over satirical treatises in the candlelit hours of the early morning. He has also tended bar.

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