Overweight people should pay 'fat tax' to cover healthcare costs, German MP says

[Bloodeagle]

Overweight people should pay 'fat tax' to cover healthcare costs, German MP says
Overweight people should pay higher taxes in order to cover the extra costs they create for German's healthcare system, a conservative MP has said.


By Allan Hall in Berlin
Published: 5:06PM BST 22 Jul 2010
Overweight people should pay 'fat tax' to cover healthcare costs, German MP says
Treatment in Germany for obesity-related illnesses is esitmated at £16 billion a year

"The question must be admitted whether the immense costs that, for example, arise from excessive consumption of food, can be permanently paid out of the consolidated health system," said Marco Wanderwitz, the conservative MP for the state of Saxony.

"I think it's sensible that people who knowingly live unhealthily carry a responsibility for it in a financial respect," said Mr Wanderwitz, who is also head of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats's group of young parliamentarians

He was supported by Juergen Wasem, an economist who said foods like chocolate should carry health warnings.

"As with tobacco, we should tax the purchase of unhealthy consumer goods at a higher rate and pay that tax into the health system," he said.

Germany's health system is funded by a series of mandatory health insurance funds, all of which are reporting serious deficits as the system is overused.

Bild, the German newspaper, estimated that treatment for obesity-related illnesses cost Germany some £16 billion a year.

Recently the German Teachers' Association recommended weighing children in class each day and reporting the seriously overweight to social services, who would have the power to remove them to clinics.

Although opposition politicians blasted the "fat-tax" proposal, researchers at the Jacobs University in Bremen claimed its work proved that the majority of the public would back a tax on people whose unhealthy lifestyles landed them in hospital or under other medical care.
SOURCE

[Curtis24]

Actually, a better solution would be for the government to regulate caloric-content in foods while offering more intensive education in schools. Taxing tobacco didn't do anything to stop people from smoking. What did work was educating the public and limiting use through legislation.

[RoyBatty]

"Fat tax" is utter BS. Why should people arbitrarily be punished based on how much they weigh?

People who abuse the national health system and run up huge avoidable and unnecessary expenses should be made to pay more for it, irrespective of "how much they weigh".

[Cato]

Put em all out in the slop pen with the rest of the hogs.

[RoyBatty]

Put em all out in the slop pen with the rest of the hogs.

But what do we do about all the meds junkies?

[Cato]

But what do we do about all the meds junkies?

Enforced detox.

[Curtis24]

Put em all out in the slop pen with the rest of the hogs.

This attitude is destructive, and I should know, living in America. For the past 30 years, Americans have embraced the ideal of individuals being given as much personal responsibility as possible. And we have run ourselves into the ground. As much as we all like to envision a libertarian society where people rise and fall according to their merits, the reality is that in libertarian societies the ruthless band together and manipulate everyone else for their own self-interest. And the even harder truth is that most people are very open for manipulation, due to not having the time or energy to make informed choices. People have to spend so much time just trying to develop a career and pay the bills that they just don't have the energy to educate themselves about healthy lifestyles, or the right way to raise one's children, and the result is relying on authority figures who themselves are basically psychopaths lining their own pockets.

This is why white Americans(and yes, notice the word white, blacks alone are not responsible for the following facts) are more obese than Europeans, more uneducated and unsophisticated, and generally unhappier. Not to mention the blatant support of illegal immigration by our federal government, despite the clear opposition to such immigration by the American public. This is not the way people should live.

[nisse]

We def. need one. Why should I pay for others' inability to feed themselves properly? There already is a tax on smoking, there should be one on eating too much ("too much" can only be determined by the outcome though).

[Curtis24]

see above. for the past 30 years America has embraced your attitude, and look at the results..

[nisse]

B.S. You are telling me that Americans are fat because they oppose taxes? No they are fat because their parents didn't teach them to eat properly/they disregarded their parents' advice/they just don't care about the consequences of their actions.

In Canada at least one province already pays for lipos - something they wouldn't have to do if the people realized the damage overeating does. If their flab is not enough of an indication, may be a tax will help.