Tax the Fat?

[herulach]

And that makes it easier to deal with?

Fat people tend not to be happy about being fat which leads to depression which leads to eating more which leads to getting fatter which leads to...

I've been clinically depressed for most of my adult life, I'm also fat. Guess when I started putting on weight? Self loathing isn't fun nor is it easy to deal with.

How about going down the gym? Yeah, because that makes you feel good. All the dirty looks from the fit people really help with your self esteem.

Swimming? Don't make me laugh!

How about taking up jogging? Better do it where there's no kids, they're the cruelest of all.

Being fat is no fun, doing something about it is not as easy as thin people think but it's not impossible.

I'm taking more exercise and trying to eat less crap, I'm getting there slowly. In the meantime what I really need is judgemental assholes to piss off and leave me alone so I can get on with it.

Fair points, but, i think youre dismissing your options too easily, go to a good local gym, youll probably see just as many if notmore unfit people in their than fit ones. Mountainbike clbs also tend to be fairly on the large side (ive been out with 3, and the average waistline in all of them was probaby about 40+ inches.

I agree with you about beng fat iso fun (bmi was around32 when i was in sixth form) however, it is easy to loose, twice a week at the gym saw me drop a stone in weight, and about 8 inches off my waist in 6 months, and this is while working in kfc, so probably eating their at least twice 3/4 days of the week

I agree that Body Mass Index is not the best way to decide someones taxation. What they should do is submerge people underwater and then release them, measuring how quickly they bob to the surface. Sort of a buoyancy tax. This way all the muscular people would not be unfairly penalised.

I've been saying this for years. Smokers contribute net £bn's to the NHS through duty, minus lung cancer costs. The obese pay nothing and cost £bn's. So they should:

1. Tax corporations like McDonalds with a special obesity levy.
2. Charge a higher rate of VAT on clothes above a certain size

or best of all

3. Make it illegal to import, manufacture or own clothes above a certain size OTHER THAN a standard government issued guantanamo bay-style orange jumpsuit. The stigma of wearing the jumpsuit would encourage people to get below that size, and stay below. Then reduce that size each year in the budget, like the fuel tax escalator, until we have a healthy and active population again

Attitues likethat really dont help, ciggarettes are easily taxed as tobacco is obviously bad for you.

Free or very subsidised access to council gyms/health centres/swimming pools would proabbly go some way to stemmign the problem.

[Kebab]

Taxing Mc Donalds or any fast food is a good idea, as some of this tax would go back to paying a bit of cost of obesity in this country. Taxing tobacco has helped, there are less people taking up smoking now then there was 10 years ago, and even if there is still a lot of people who smoke then the tax they generate covers more than what they cost to the NHS so am all for them to smoke as long as it is not in my face.

Free gym would only benefit people who are already going regularly to the gym. i dont think fat people get dirty looks in they gym (well council gyms anyway) as everyone is concentrating on working on themselves. But if people like GDVS think or are ideed given dirty looks then they will not go to the gym even if it is free.

[BEANFro Elite]

I think a tax is reasonable, but then again how does one cost-effectively test wether its a genetic thing or just a neglect thing, you have to realise the government is also at fault here as the food that is fed to our children in schools is simply not good enough and as such a tax on the fat seems rather like entrapment.

Seeing as our children are becoming increasingly fatter and unhealthy, the government needs to be more strict with the curriculums, I'd say an hour of compulsary physical exercise a day is more than fair, this will help more than just the fat problem.

Then there needs to be more money spent on food served in schools, staff training, there needs to be more health related lessons in school, junkfood needs to be more tightly regulated and there needs to be parental training programmes that help to educate parents.

Its also worth pointing out that children behave and learn more effectively when on a good diet.


I'll end by saying...

What I've higlighted above is the approach the government should take as opposed to slapping another tax on its citizens as I see this as just another way for them to cash in on our ills.

This is also dealing with the problem at the root, when this is dealt with then the NHS can save money as there'd be less fat people.

And most importantly, with a stronger enthasis on sports and exercise England would stand a better chance of winning things in whatever sports the compete in...

And before I get attacked, I'm aware my approach would cost a lot of money but I think its a worthy investment.

[Blackmage]

I think taxing fat is plane wrong, as there a numerous reasons why people are fat. FAT PEOPLE DO WORK ASWELL, not only that they pay tax on clothing too. just because your fat doesn't mean you sit on a sofa watching day time TV. Fat people have rights too.

one thing i don't like though is the lack of people willing to do something about it, all it takes is proper eating and exercise going to the gym 2hrs a day three times a week won't kill you.

being fat before, when i started to go gym i lost weight, cut out the snacking on crap i have found i lost weight very and feel more confident, i even found out that i have muscles that i didn't knew exsisted.

But i think if a person wants to live like that leave them it's their life, whithin 6months you can lose a hell of a lot weight though.

[herulach]

Ive just thought of a better idea, instead of taxing fatty foods, slap a tac on coke, but not diet. I know i used to have the calorie equivalent of 2lbs of fat a week in coke before i made a concious effort to cut down

[Blackmage]

Ive just thought of a better idea, instead of taxing fatty foods, slap a tac on coke, but not diet. I know i used to have the calorie equivalent of 2lbs of fat a week in coke before i made a concious effort to cut down

but, why should it be taxed for all the non-fat people.

[Alex]

Why on earth is everyone trying to figure out ways to punish fat people, instead of trying to figure out ways to help fat people excercise and eat healthier? What about NHS gyms for fat people, lose weight clinics, or tax allowances on healthy food, rather than trying to tax unhealthy food - that way healthy food becomes more reasonable, and everyone wins. Why bother trying to make being fat more unpleasant? I doubt many fat people are happy about it as it is. Lets try and make it easier for fat people to lose weight instead and be healthier instead,

[Whiternoise]

Agreed, as i said, instead of taxation, simply make fat people attend compulsory weightloss sessions and counselling. Or not even compulsory, just give some extra benefits for people who complete the course.

[Rave]

I only saw the very end of the program, when he was talking to John Prescott. I was incredulous when Prescott's flunky reckoned a fat tax would be 'a bit Big Brother'- what, and forcing every citizen to turn up and be fingerprinted and iris scanned for an ID card isn't? What a retard. While they're being processed you could pop them on the scales and get the calipers out too- would only take an extra minute or so.

However- A fat tax would be quite unacceptable nanny-statism IMO. Yes fat peoiple cost the NHS loadsamoney, but they don't live as long which saves us on pensions. It's swings and roundabouts. I'm all for the government encouraging people to lose weight and be healthy voluntarily, but at the end of the day it is their choice to be fat. Yes, a few people take it to extremes and get so fat they can't move, but the £8m a year they cost (?) is a piddling drop in the ocean compared to the billions that get spent on all the other people on the dole or incapacity benefit. It's simply not worth worrying about.

[Million]

I think taxing fat is plane wrong, as there a numerous reasons why people are fat. FAT PEOPLE DO WORK ASWELL, not only that they pay tax on clothing too. just because your fat doesn't mean you sit on a sofa watching day time TV. Fat people have rights too.

Of course they still do work, but the problem is that the overweight cost the NHS millions a year on treatments that would be unnecessary if there were fewer obese people to treat - coronary heart disease, osteoarthritis, diabetes to name just a few. Diabetes is predicted to become epidemic frighteningly soon - I can't remember the stats but I had a lecture recently on it and was terrified that the NHS will be overwhelmed by the time I qualify in 2010.

It's a fair point that tax may not be the best idea - my BMI is spot on but i still love the occasional Sara-Lee cheesecake or a McDonalds. Tax breaks on healthy food is a good plan.

the major problems are:
1. Lack of health education in working class populations - people still don't know what they need to eat to stay healthy, or if they do they don't know how to prepare it
2. People will buy crappy food cos it's cheap and easy to whack in the microwave

the bottom line is education

[Hans Voralberg]

Agreed, as i said, instead of taxation, simply make fat people attend compulsory weightloss sessions and counselling. Or not even compulsory, just give some extra benefits for people who complete the course.

Getting fat people to exercises can be quite a nightmare. Even worse if they have some sort of eating disorder, convincing them doesnt go anywhere. I once lived with an anorexic and now a guy who just eat way too much , thank god something wrong with him he cant get fat no matter how much he eat.

[Kumagoro]

I need some motivation to lose weight and losing money is good motivation for me.

[noah]

the bottom line is education

the boy speaketh the truth.

trouble is getting the government to find the time and money from their resources to fund it. there's plenty of anti smoking/anti drink driving campains in magazines and on tv, but i dont remember seeing any anti obesity ones?

[Knoxville]

Quite frankly I find some of the idea's and comments in this thread to be ridiculous. For a start how do you quantify who is fat enough to get taxed and who ain't? Now I'm overweight but I have no problem working, I pay just as much tax as the next person when I employed (I'm currently out of work but thats neither here nor there).

Now I'm nearly 21, I drink, smoke and am overweight hence forth I must be an enourmous drain on the NHS right? I must be slurping up your tax money inbetween milkshakes.......In my entire life I've only been into hospital once, over night with a concsussion.

Tax the larger clothes! Tax fizzy drinks! Tax food!

Do you lot have any idea how ridiculous you sound?

The fat people that are using you're tax money are an extreme minority, and they in my opinion have no excuse for being 40/50/60 stone because honestly how people can put on THAT much weight is beyond even me.

But herein lies my point, people with anorexia, an eating disorder at the other end of the scale entirely (bad pun I know) have counselling centers, home's and therapists paid for by the NHS. Not only getting more of your tax money, they are actually recieving help. Now you may remember earlier in my post a few paragraph's up I mentioned that overweight people pay exactly the same level of tax as everyone else?

They recieve no help from the NHS until they reach uber 60 stone planet status, there is no treatment, no help and no way of helping to catch things early on, overwieght people are simply told to "loose weight" that quote comes from a GP that did my mothers health insurance physical not long ago and I don't care what anyone says, loosing any significant amount of weight isn't easy, yet no help was offered to her, no advice, nothing.......and now from what I read here overweight people like her and many others are going to be made to pay extra tax for the non-existant medical help they recieve, just doesn't seem right.

[Knoxville]

the boy speaketh the truth.

trouble is getting the government to find the time and money from their resources to fund it. there's plenty of anti smoking/anti drink driving campains in magazines and on tv, but i dont remember seeing any anti obesity ones?

There's already enough of a stigma around being fat, trust me fat people know when they're fat they don't need to see it in a t.v ad. Before the government starts worrying about anti-obesity ad campaign's it wants to start looking towards a way of cutting down on teenage pregnancy's, because thats part of the education system that needs a rethink.

[Mike Fishcake]

Do you lot have any idea how ridiculous you sound?

I agree. Very much so.