(3) Taxation is highly effective, because if affects massive numbers of people are low to no additional counterfactual cost. CEAs that I’ve run myself (or that Charity Entrepreneurship has done) on tobacco/​alcohol taxation, plus the extremely strong underlying epidemiological/​economic research on the price elasticity of demand for tobacco/​alcohol, all reinforces this point.
I’m fairly sympathetic to the freedom of choice argument. Quick calculations I’ve done on this area suggest that under fairly plausible moral weights of freedom to smoke/​drink etc, (a) it’s welfare negative to legally ban alcohol/​smoking (even leaving aside the black market effects and assuming these taxes work perfectly, which of course they won’t); however (b) aggressive taxes while keeping the product legal generally pass the cost-benefit analysis test. See CEARCH’s evaluative framework for our treatment of moral weights for freedom, or examples of BOTECs/​CEAs where tax policies are evaluated based on both health and freedom considerations.
oh cool! (Also I’m glad you proactively acknowledge the eg saturated fat)
Also, are there risks to over-reduction in salt intake?
Hmmmm. I’m suspicious is because it doesn’t make any sense for anyone to decide what’s best for me. (Sure, educate me instead, whatever.) (I’m particularly suspicious of this because of the discourse I’ve seen around proposed ‘meat taxes’, typically pedaled by people who think the climate and nutritional (and ethical) effects are far worse than I think they are. So I’m worried about the same thing here.)
(1) & (2) The Cochrane reviews/​GBD results (e.g. https://​​www.bmj.com/​​content/​​346/​​bmj.f1325 on sodium/​​hypertension and https://​​jamanetwork.com/​​journals/​​jama/​​fullarticle/​​2596292 on hypertension/​​DALYs) and the scientific consensus more generally seems fairly compelling to be, and while I wouldn’t rule out all this being wrong (e.g. the saturated fat issue), it seems fairly reasonable/​​prudent to deprioritize research into this area of uncertainty relative to others.
(3) Taxation is highly effective, because if affects massive numbers of people are low to no additional counterfactual cost. CEAs that I’ve run myself (or that Charity Entrepreneurship has done) on tobacco/​alcohol taxation, plus the extremely strong underlying epidemiological/​economic research on the price elasticity of demand for tobacco/​alcohol, all reinforces this point.
I’m fairly sympathetic to the freedom of choice argument. Quick calculations I’ve done on this area suggest that under fairly plausible moral weights of freedom to smoke/​drink etc, (a) it’s welfare negative to legally ban alcohol/​smoking (even leaving aside the black market effects and assuming these taxes work perfectly, which of course they won’t); however (b) aggressive taxes while keeping the product legal generally pass the cost-benefit analysis test. See CEARCH’s evaluative framework for our treatment of moral weights for freedom, or examples of BOTECs/​CEAs where tax policies are evaluated based on both health and freedom considerations.
oh cool! (Also I’m glad you proactively acknowledge the eg saturated fat)
Also, are there risks to over-reduction in salt intake?
Hmmmm. I’m suspicious is because it doesn’t make any sense for anyone to decide what’s best for me. (Sure, educate me instead, whatever.) (I’m particularly suspicious of this because of the discourse I’ve seen around proposed ‘meat taxes’, typically pedaled by people who think the climate and nutritional (and ethical) effects are far worse than I think they are. So I’m worried about the same thing here.)