Soda Size Ban Dead and Gone in New York

One group of people that Bloomberg did not consider in his ban on large size sodas were construction and maintenance workers. And boy are they pissed.

Construction and maintenance workers have a daily routine of going and filling up a huge cup of soda, which they will drink all day, along with their lunches and snacks. The were highly offended when Bloomberg did not even think to ask them how this would affect them. In such jobs, which are exposed to outdoor weather, one doesn’t have time to run to the store for another 6 oz soda.

They came out against this ban in droves and have been voicing their opinion for the past few weeks.

It seems ridiculous, in my opinion, that grown men, working hard are told what to drink. A lot of these men are the ones that keeps the very buildings the mayor walks around in in tip top condition.

At the heart of the ban is actually more taxes. It is the largest tax grab in the history of the city, and New Yorkers are clueless about it.

By this legislation, since people are used to 32oz and 64oz barrels of soda, the ban calls for sizes 16oz or smaller.  People will have a tendency to purchase multiples of the same soda. While the price of the soda might go down, the overall taxes will triple or even quadruple. And, since some people purchased multiple 64oz jugs of soda each day, these purchases will continue unabated, and the tax revenue will skyrocket.

However, petitioners went to the New York State Court, beverage makers and minority businessmen and the judge rescinded the legislation. First of all, one cannot really call it legislation. Bloomberg never went to the city council to have the bill even voted on. He went directly to the health board. This is the same health board that he appointed the members to. Unsurprisingly the health board voted the bill in. They stated that of 38,000 comments submitted to them, 32,000 were all positive. Yet, when casual surveys were taken by city news papers, very few favorable comments were found.

The judge said the Mayor did not have such authority to unilaterally pass such legislation, and nor does an appointed health board.