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Should we have a fat tax? · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
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Speaker 1: From House Stuff Works dot Com? Hey, and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the podcast. This is Josh Clark, Charles W. Chuck Bryant
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Speaker 1: is taking a refreshing sip off of a low Craw
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Speaker 1: a plaid short sleep t shirt shirt shirt. Uh, and
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Speaker 1: I'm wearing jeans. That means that this is stuff you
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Speaker 1: should know. That's right. Yeah, that's the formula, the secret formula.
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Speaker 1: Jeans on you, plaid shirt on me, nothing from the
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Speaker 1: waist down on you. That's socks. Of course, it makes
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Speaker 1: the whole thing so much more unsettling. I think. Still
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Speaker 1: there's nothing. There's not much funnier than socks and shoes
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Speaker 1: on with no pants. Yeah, it's just a homerson. It's
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Speaker 1: always funny. He's nailed it, especially with his pointy little
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Speaker 1: brown shoes. The big road Ton Pubic Mountain. Then he
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Speaker 1: has he's awesome. Umuck, it's been a long time, hasn't it.
1:15
Speaker 1: We we've been out of the office for two weeks.
1:18
Speaker 1: Just so people know we're getting back into things, and
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Speaker 1: it's refreshing to do our to do something that we're
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Speaker 1: good at. Ye, yeah, it is some saying. It gives
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Speaker 1: me a sense of control. Um, I feel like we're
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Speaker 1: good at this, Chuck. We know what we're doing, except
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Speaker 1: for maybe the Union's one man. No. I mean it
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Speaker 1: was good. All the information was there, but like I
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Speaker 1: I've it sounded like I've had a transorbital lobotomy, like
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Speaker 1: just moments before we started, did you. We'll see, Um,
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Speaker 1: this one is going to be a good one. My friend,
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Speaker 1: remember the tipping episode. It's gonna make that look like poop. Um,
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Speaker 1: we're talking today, Chuck. As I know you know about
2:01
Speaker 1: the possibility of a fat tax. That's right, and it's well,
2:07
Speaker 1: well we'll get to exactly what it is in a second,
2:10
Speaker 1: but um, let's talk about why you would even consider
2:15
Speaker 1: taxing fat. It seems like, Chuck, there is an obesity
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Speaker 1: epidemic in the United States, and not just the United States,
2:22
Speaker 1: but in the western world. We're not the only fatties,
2:25
Speaker 1: although we are typically the fattiest of the fatties. Uh yeah,
2:30
Speaker 1: oh yeah, well we're the best in everything by percentage.
2:34
Speaker 1: I think there are more obest people in the States
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Speaker 1: than um elsewhere. Yes, but it is still a problem.
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Speaker 1: It's very prevalent everywhere. When you mean, I went to Japan,
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Speaker 1: she was, she was like, everyone in Japan is so thin.
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Speaker 1: Everyone is very thin, They're very small pieces. We went
2:49
Speaker 1: and I was like, you sure when the last time
2:51
Speaker 1: you were here? Um, So, yeah, it's it's everywhere. But
2:55
Speaker 1: they would probably say, like, we're just fat now because
2:57
Speaker 1: we're eating American foods. That is what they said, because
3:00
Speaker 1: you know what, they're probably right, dude, they're McDonald's makes
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Speaker 1: our McDonald's look again like poop. Like they have the
3:08
Speaker 1: this thing called the Mega muffin, and it's a an
3:13
Speaker 1: egg McMuffin with sausage and like extra egg and it's
3:19
Speaker 1: huge and it's probably the most delicious thing I've ever
3:21
Speaker 1: eaten in my life. I'll eat a sausage McMuffin with
3:24
Speaker 1: egg right now. And then, well, you can get an
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Speaker 1: egg McMuffin with sausage here in the States if you
3:28
Speaker 1: know what to ask for. But it costs you like
3:30
Speaker 1: six bucks, but it's worth it, that's true. But anyway, yes, um,
3:34
Speaker 1: the double egg interests me though. Yeah, No, it is true,
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Speaker 1: Like it's six bucks easy. Yeah. Um, okay, So in
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Speaker 1: the United States, let's throw out some statistics because this
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Speaker 1: is where we live. And again, the United States is
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Speaker 1: the greatest country in the world when it comes to
3:50
Speaker 1: obese people producing the obese um an. Obesity costs the
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Speaker 1: US an estimated hundred and fifty billion dollars a year
4:01
Speaker 1: UH in healthcare costs. That's a significant amount of meatballs. Yeah,
4:07
Speaker 1: of all medical costs of Medicare, costs are oh during
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Speaker 1: the last year of life or due to obesity. This
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Speaker 1: AT's significant. Yeah. I thought that was a weird statistic though,
4:22
Speaker 1: wasn't it. Yeah, I thought it was a lot um.
4:24
Speaker 1: That guy, that polster who you're quoting, he was definitely biased.
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Speaker 1: It seemed like which I know, but I'm saying, like
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Speaker 1: even still, he was like, here's this poll that we
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Speaker 1: just conducted, and here's how I feel about it, Mattie. Um,
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Speaker 1: so we've got a lot of money being put into
4:41
Speaker 1: treating UH diseases that rise from UM obesity. A preventable disease. Well, yeah,
4:47
Speaker 1: obesity is considered a chronic disease, which is something that
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Speaker 1: can be treated and prevented through behavior modification like shock therapy,
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Speaker 1: which costs far less than treating heart disease. That's point one. Um,
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Speaker 1: let's see, the costs are expected to rise. And um,
5:08
Speaker 1: however you feel about Obamacare, take that off the table,
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Speaker 1: put it on the table, take it off the table
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Speaker 1: either way. Um, if we don't change the amount of
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Speaker 1: money we're putting into care for um, obesity related diseases,
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Speaker 1: those costs are gonna go up just because the sheer
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Speaker 1: number of obese people are expected to rise. There's something
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Speaker 1: like sevent of Americans are either overweight or obese. Yeah,
5:35
Speaker 1: it is a lot, and it's I think more than
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Speaker 1: a third of Americans are obese, and obese is a
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Speaker 1: body mass index of thirty thirty ms per square meter, right,
5:47
Speaker 1: And then they're kind of refining that so it's not
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Speaker 1: just weight anymore. It's the amount of fat you have
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Speaker 1: on your body. And apparently there's a move toward refining
5:56
Speaker 1: that even further, which is how much fat do you
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Speaker 1: have on your upper body? Which is the really unhealthy
6:01
Speaker 1: stuff out of post? Right, I know I can't gain
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Speaker 1: a pound below my waist. I think I'm like my dad.
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Speaker 1: I carried all between my my chin and my waistline
6:11
Speaker 1: is there? Right? Oh? Yeah, I got skinny little legs.
6:14
Speaker 1: I don't get like the big butt that some guys get.
6:16
Speaker 1: You know, I've noticed since I've been running, my butt
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Speaker 1: has gone up and out a little bit, and I
6:22
Speaker 1: guess that's what's supposed to be, but I don't like it. Man,
6:25
Speaker 1: I'm self conscious about my bottom now. Um okay, so
6:30
Speaker 1: the uh the percentage of obast people in the US,
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Speaker 1: chuck UM is supposed to go from about a third
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Speaker 1: right at now to forty. That's just not overweight, that's obesie.
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Speaker 1: That's creeping up to half the country. That's a lot.
6:50
Speaker 1: It's nice to have something to shoot for. So there's
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Speaker 1: a lot of UM as a nation. There's a lot
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Speaker 1: of reasons that people would start talking king about instituting
7:01
Speaker 1: a fat tax. And when we're talking about the fat text,
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Speaker 1: we're talking about this concept that was first UM introduced
7:08
Speaker 1: by a Yale psychologist named Kelly D. Brown. Oh yeah,
7:12
Speaker 1: the twinkie tax. I hate. Did they throw twinkie on
7:14
Speaker 1: any everything? I always do anytime something has to do
7:17
Speaker 1: with junk food, they throw twink cancer like the twinkie defense.
7:20
Speaker 1: The word twinkie was never uttered during UM the trial. Yeah,
7:24
Speaker 1: during the trial, it was all junk food. That was
7:26
Speaker 1: a Harvey Milk thing, right, Yeah, it was uh yeah,
7:31
Speaker 1: the Dan White trial it was no and he never
7:34
Speaker 1: mentioned twinkie, but that was the press. They just put
7:36
Speaker 1: Twinkie on anything they can't Uh yeah, he's he first
7:40
Speaker 1: coined it. And this was back in the New York Times,
7:43
Speaker 1: so it's not the newest idea to be floated. Um.
7:47
Speaker 1: And there there's some different ways that people have suggested
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Speaker 1: that we go about this. He has a couple of proposals.
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Speaker 1: One is tax saying seven on unhealthy foods and then
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Speaker 1: use that venue to subsidize healthy foods to make it cheaper,
8:03
Speaker 1: to make that cheaper less expensive. And the idea behind
8:06
Speaker 1: that is what that people just buy unhealthy food because
8:10
Speaker 1: it's cheaper because it traditionally is is that I wonder
8:13
Speaker 1: if we would find out if that's the case. I
8:15
Speaker 1: don't think that's the case. I don't know. I mean,
8:18
Speaker 1: I think people buy those foods because they want to
8:20
Speaker 1: buy that junk and eat it. I guess it depends
8:23
Speaker 1: on what you're talking about though, Like if it's a
8:25
Speaker 1: TV dinner, you're looking for dinner and that's super cheap, right,
8:30
Speaker 1: So if you if they're healthier alternatives that are cheaper
8:33
Speaker 1: than that, then maybe they would go with a healthier alternative.
8:36
Speaker 1: But when you want an oreo, you want an oreo.
8:40
Speaker 1: But I bet you could get one of them. The
8:42
Speaker 1: little Healthy Choice meals for about the same as a
8:44
Speaker 1: TV dinner. It was about the same price. I wonder.
8:47
Speaker 1: I wonder though, also if proportion has to do with
8:49
Speaker 1: it too. I think proportion control is a huge portion.
8:53
Speaker 1: Portion proportion. Well, when you're comparing a healthy Choice to
8:58
Speaker 1: a hungry man, it's proportion. But uh, and the other
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Speaker 1: thing is too though. I mean the Healthy Choice meals
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Speaker 1: and those those diet meals White Watchers meals. They are
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Speaker 1: lower in um, I guess, like fats and calories and
9:10
Speaker 1: stuff like that, it's still be hard to argue that
9:13
Speaker 1: they're healthy. Any kind of like package processed food like
9:17
Speaker 1: that is inherently it's not like super healthy. I guess
9:19
Speaker 1: you're right, but it's probably better than the hungry man. Well,
9:22
Speaker 1: it's like the whole thing with um high freak toast
9:24
Speaker 1: corn syrup like sugar. Refined sugar is a healthy comparison
9:30
Speaker 1: to it, you know, like um, that whole throwback thing
9:32
Speaker 1: that PEPSI did, right, Like that was supposed to be
9:35
Speaker 1: better for you, but they used just to refined sugar
9:37
Speaker 1: instead of high fruit toast corn syrup. So I wonder
9:39
Speaker 1: if what you're saying then is that's along the same lines.
9:42
Speaker 1: I guess, well, yeah, and that presents one of the
9:43
Speaker 1: problems that we'll get to is how do you if
9:45
Speaker 1: you're gonna do something like this, where do you draw
9:47
Speaker 1: the line and how do you attack this? Is it
9:50
Speaker 1: just sweets and fatty foods? Or you know, a pint
9:54
Speaker 1: of Ben and Jerry's ice cream is made with really
9:56
Speaker 1: healthy natural ingredients, but it's full of fat and calor
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Speaker 1: eas whereas a healthy choice quote unquote is processed and
10:04
Speaker 1: loaded with preservatives, but it's lower in calorie, so it's hinky.
10:09
Speaker 1: You present a sticky conunder and how they're going to
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Speaker 1: figure this out if it if it ever goes through um.
10:14
Speaker 1: So that was the first proposal by Brown l Um
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Speaker 1: basically seven percent tax used that the revenue to fund
10:22
Speaker 1: or subsidize healthier stuff, right, yeah, and they can actually
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Speaker 1: I don't know how they did this, but Oxford University
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Speaker 1: actually put a number of value on how many lives
10:30
Speaker 1: a year that could save um, and they claim that
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Speaker 1: a seventeen point five percent value added tax um could
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Speaker 1: save up to thirty lives a year. And I guess
10:41
Speaker 1: that's probably just in England. I'm imagining, right, I believe.
10:45
Speaker 1: So there's like England's all over this as well. It's
10:48
Speaker 1: a U S and England. Well, Europe is kind of
10:51
Speaker 1: moving towards this. But yeah, the studies that we came
10:53
Speaker 1: across seem to be mostly British in origin. They love
10:57
Speaker 1: their studies every day they do. So that's one one proposal. Um,
11:03
Speaker 1: what's the second one? Well, the second one was less aggressive.
11:05
Speaker 1: It was basically just um tax a lesser amount onto
11:11
Speaker 1: unhealthy food and then funnel that into public education. And
11:14
Speaker 1: brown else said that would probably be easier to get
11:18
Speaker 1: pushed through legislatively, but it would have less of an effect. Yeah,
11:25
Speaker 1: I mean, if you're gonna do this, and I mean
11:27
Speaker 1: I don't even know if it's a good idea or not.
11:29
Speaker 1: I'd rather see cheaper healthy food than some stupid campaign,
11:34
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, the whole awareness campaign. I have doubts
11:36
Speaker 1: about the effectiveness of those things. Well, they have an
11:39
Speaker 1: obesity awareness campaign going on, and it's like they're using
11:42
Speaker 1: these poor fat kids as models, and it's like, what
11:44
Speaker 1: school do you go to? You have to be private
11:47
Speaker 1: tutored now because you're literally the poster child for obesity,
11:51
Speaker 1: you know. Um. So, you were saying that the Brits
11:55
Speaker 1: came up with the the the idea of doing a
11:58
Speaker 1: seventeen point five value added team point five percent value
12:01
Speaker 1: added tacks. Right, value added taxes Basically like every time
12:05
Speaker 1: UM raw material comes into the manufacturing plant, there's a
12:09
Speaker 1: tax on that. UM. When the manufacturer finishes the final product,
12:14
Speaker 1: sends it to a exporter, there's a tax on that.
12:17
Speaker 1: Exporter gives it to a distributor, there's a tax on that.
12:20
Speaker 1: And ultimately all these taxes build up and are passed
12:23
Speaker 1: on to the consumer, right um. And then the savings
12:27
Speaker 1: aren't passed on that the taxes to the extra payment. Um.
12:31
Speaker 1: So the these these Brits who studied that found that
12:34
Speaker 1: if you if you did that seventeen point five percent
12:36
Speaker 1: tax and you just did it on foods with saturated fat,
12:40
Speaker 1: that it could actually be counterproductive. They modeled it and
12:45
Speaker 1: they found that it would drive people to other foods
12:50
Speaker 1: and uh yeah like uh and and would have even
12:54
Speaker 1: more severe health consequences, right, um. And then what's more,
12:58
Speaker 1: here's a big problem too. Um. It would increase food
13:01
Speaker 1: costs by about three two. So here's here's here's where
13:06
Speaker 1: we reach a really So if you're a liberal, right,
13:09
Speaker 1: and you're like, no, we need to we need to
13:11
Speaker 1: look out for people. These people don't understand the the
13:15
Speaker 1: the consequences of their eating habits, and their diet habits
13:18
Speaker 1: are passing me along to their children. We're all gonna
13:20
Speaker 1: die at age fifty. Um, So we need this kind
13:23
Speaker 1: of tax. And somebody goes, uh, it's it's regressive, so
13:26
Speaker 1: it's unfairly taxing the poor, and every liberal just goes
13:29
Speaker 1: forget it, just forget it all, never get behind it.
13:32
Speaker 1: And that's part of the problem because you know, the
13:35
Speaker 1: poor tend to spend a larger percentage of their income
13:38
Speaker 1: on food, so if you start taxing food, it's going
13:42
Speaker 1: to unfairly hit the poor harder than anybody else. So
13:47
Speaker 1: they found the three point two for that, um for
13:49
Speaker 1: that one that's just saturated that and they did too
13:52
Speaker 1: other models too. Yeah, the one um where they actually
13:56
Speaker 1: assign a score rating to your food. Um. And don't
13:59
Speaker 1: ask me about the stands for but the ssc G
14:02
Speaker 1: three D score. I looked, I couldn't find what it
14:04
Speaker 1: stands for super secret. Let's just call it that the
14:07
Speaker 1: super secret score. UM. So that basically they're gonna rate
14:10
Speaker 1: foods based on UM eight nutrients and a higher score
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Speaker 1: is bad if you're if you're a plus eight, then
14:18
Speaker 1: you're going to get taxed more. And that would save lives.
14:23
Speaker 1: I guess is that a year? Yeah? And then UM
14:26
Speaker 1: increase four percent, so even higher increase in food costs, right,
14:30
Speaker 1: but it saves lives rather than having more severe negative
14:34
Speaker 1: consequences UM. And it's it hits that sweet spot that
14:39
Speaker 1: you're looking for the science, right, So, like you could
14:42
Speaker 1: run anything conceivably through this algorithm. Doesn't it's blind to
14:46
Speaker 1: whether it's lean cuisine or ho hose. It's gonna spit
14:50
Speaker 1: out a score, and depending on the score, you get
14:52
Speaker 1: taxed or not. That makes a little more sense. It
14:54
Speaker 1: does still though four percent increase in UM food UH costs,
15:00
Speaker 1: that's significant, it is UH. And then the third one
15:02
Speaker 1: was where basically it was they spread the tax among
15:06
Speaker 1: a bunch of different foods, almost half of all foods.
15:11
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't understand. Yeah, I didn't get
15:14
Speaker 1: this one, okay, so um, but what we did. What
15:17
Speaker 1: they found was that it saves lives, but it increases
15:20
Speaker 1: taxes by about four point six percent. So if you're
15:22
Speaker 1: an anglophile and you are into studies and you like
15:27
Speaker 1: choosing multiply um, you would probably go with number two.
15:31
Speaker 1: I think it makes the most sense, and it should
15:36
Speaker 1: everyone else. I was just describing ourselves. Um. Actually, in
15:40
Speaker 1: Britain they already do this on some things like ice
15:43
Speaker 1: cream and potato chips they mentioned in here, UM already
15:46
Speaker 1: have a value out of tacks. And in some states,
15:49
Speaker 1: and no, George is not one of them, they tax
15:51
Speaker 1: um small taxes on soft drinks and things like that. See.
15:54
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's true, because um, I found
15:57
Speaker 1: this one. Uh, this one article about Redmond, California, where
16:02
Speaker 1: they're talking about adding a one cent per ounce soda
16:05
Speaker 1: tax and it says that they would be the first
16:08
Speaker 1: city in the country to actually push it through. Yeah,
16:12
Speaker 1: well maybe it does. Say California and Maine in Maryland
16:15
Speaker 1: had fat taxes UM approved and then repealed. So yeah,
16:20
Speaker 1: first sitting in the nation to Levey attack specifically targeting
16:23
Speaker 1: soda and sugar laden beverage is interesting. So, but if
16:26
Speaker 1: this goes through, it's coming up pretty soon, I guess
16:29
Speaker 1: in November. But if it goes through, there's that one
16:33
Speaker 1: problem again where it's a regressive tax because it's a
16:37
Speaker 1: fixed amount. It's one cent per ounce, and because of that,
16:43
Speaker 1: the cheaper the value of an ounce of soda, the
16:48
Speaker 1: more percentage you're gonna pay in taxes. Right, So let's
16:51
Speaker 1: say you pay a dollar for your generic store brand
16:54
Speaker 1: two Leader, that's sixty six or sixty seven ounces, you're
16:59
Speaker 1: gonna pay at a cent parounce, you're gonna pay an
17:02
Speaker 1: extra sixty seven cents, which is more costs. Yeah, it's
17:06
Speaker 1: almost double what you were paying before. And the people
17:09
Speaker 1: who are buying that dollar store brand two Leader are
17:11
Speaker 1: probably people who can afford the dollar, right exactly. Now,
17:16
Speaker 1: if you do a twelve pack or something like that, um,
17:19
Speaker 1: and it's a hundred and forty four ounces, but a
17:21
Speaker 1: twelve packs already like six bucks, that's only an extra
17:24
Speaker 1: dollar forty four. That's only like or something like that
17:28
Speaker 1: added tax rather than sixties. So that's why they say
17:31
Speaker 1: regressive taxes are usually unfairly burdening to the poor. Yeah,
17:36
Speaker 1: that makes sense. I see Uh, well, I see it
17:40
Speaker 1: all the time. Let's just say that you do. I
17:44
Speaker 1: used to work in in the convenience store, and so
17:46
Speaker 1: I had a a good eye on who was buying
17:49
Speaker 1: what and what kind of snacks people ate and stuff
17:52
Speaker 1: like that. I was amazed to find when I worked in, um,
17:56
Speaker 1: a gas station, that people cho white clay. Excuse me,
18:01
Speaker 1: they chew white clay. I don't know what that means.
18:04
Speaker 1: You've not seen white clay. Look around next time you're
18:07
Speaker 1: in a gas shitch, and especially out in the sticks,
18:09
Speaker 1: there'll be a little cell of fame bag with like
18:12
Speaker 1: the little paper hanger, you know, like you buy like
18:15
Speaker 1: gummy worms or whatever in like that. But um, it's
18:18
Speaker 1: a food. It is not a food item. It's clay,
18:22
Speaker 1: and people chew it. Apparently it's um it's like a
18:25
Speaker 1: folk tradition among pregnant women to chew clay. But people
18:30
Speaker 1: have like this kind of craving for it as well,
18:33
Speaker 1: and they sell this in convenient story. I never knew that. Yeah,
18:37
Speaker 1: that one always, that's a good one. I'm gonna be
18:39
Speaker 1: in the lookout now. Um. So we've talked about all
18:43
Speaker 1: the reasons why you should do this, right, Yes, it
18:48
Speaker 1: seems like this would have all been pushed through if
18:51
Speaker 1: there weren't some sort of opposition to the concept of
18:53
Speaker 1: fat taxes like Tony Blair Oh yeah, for instance, in
18:58
Speaker 1: two thousand four he called that a sign of a
19:02
Speaker 1: nanny state, and basically that kind of sums it um.
19:08
Speaker 1: Critics will argue that, you know, this is like the
19:11
Speaker 1: government once again legislating something in you're a personal decision
19:16
Speaker 1: you want to make, which is, you know what if
19:18
Speaker 1: I want to eat twinkies and get fat and dive
19:21
Speaker 1: a heart attack at forty it's my right because I
19:23
Speaker 1: love those twinkies. It makes a really good case like
19:27
Speaker 1: who who is the government to tell you you shouldn't write? Um.
19:31
Speaker 1: There is a really good argument on the other side
19:34
Speaker 1: that often comes from the same side, though, which is,
19:38
Speaker 1: m if we as a society have to pay for
19:43
Speaker 1: your health care, then yeah, you we do have a
19:46
Speaker 1: stake in telling you, you know, you can't eat that twinkie,
19:49
Speaker 1: And yeah, we agree. We can't tell you not to
19:52
Speaker 1: eat that twinkie, but we can make you think twice
19:55
Speaker 1: about it by raising the price of it. Well, and
19:59
Speaker 1: they're in brings up the third model, which is not
20:03
Speaker 1: to tax food but too um make people pay more
20:08
Speaker 1: for something like insurance if they're obese. The the text
20:13
Speaker 1: the person and not the item. Yeah, which is probably
20:17
Speaker 1: the more diabolical model of the of the others. Uh yeah,
20:24
Speaker 1: but it's also like I get that, but it's also
20:26
Speaker 1: at least it singles out the the problem. Like although
20:30
Speaker 1: some people might say the problem is the existence of
20:32
Speaker 1: the twinkie, but they don't. But but the critics will
20:36
Speaker 1: say no. But you know what, if you're super healthy
20:38
Speaker 1: and you like to indulge the twinkie every now and then,
20:40
Speaker 1: there is nothing wrong with the existence of twinkies. Check
20:43
Speaker 1: that was hypothetical, right, you know what I'm saying. But
20:46
Speaker 1: like you can't like if you love you this tax
20:48
Speaker 1: on junk food and I'm a marathon runner that once
20:53
Speaker 1: a week, I love my my Reese's cup. Why should
20:56
Speaker 1: I have to pay more money on that because a
20:58
Speaker 1: larger person eats some five times a day. See. I
21:01
Speaker 1: disagree with that though, because think about it, man, Like,
21:03
Speaker 1: like who's really paying for that that extra tax? Todd
21:08
Speaker 1: the larger person who eats them any times a day,
21:10
Speaker 1: or you who eats them once a week. It's like,
21:12
Speaker 1: buck up and pay the extra forty cents and shut up.
21:14
Speaker 1: We're trying to deal with something over here. Go run
21:17
Speaker 1: your marathon. That that's what I have to say to
21:19
Speaker 1: that person. Um, as far as it goes within the
21:23
Speaker 1: obese person, who when you are faced with that idea
21:30
Speaker 1: of having to pay more for that Reese's, there's no
21:36
Speaker 1: sweet spot. As bad as economists want to be able
21:39
Speaker 1: to say, this is the point where everyone will stop
21:43
Speaker 1: paying for Reese's and stop eating them. It's the same
21:47
Speaker 1: with gas. No one has any idea. You can take
21:49
Speaker 1: the average of all this, but it's really different for everybody.
21:53
Speaker 1: So that's one of the big challenges is how much
21:55
Speaker 1: do you raise? UM. So, if you take a way
22:01
Speaker 1: the the idea that that's going to change behavior, it
22:04
Speaker 1: might not. It might just mean that people are going
22:05
Speaker 1: to have to shell out more money, which sucks. Um. Well,
22:08
Speaker 1: what happened with smoking? Did people? Well, that is less
22:12
Speaker 1: when they started taxing the cred out of that did
22:14
Speaker 1: a really good example of how you can successfully tax
22:18
Speaker 1: unhealthy stuff um and change people's behavior. So that it
22:24
Speaker 1: did work. But they think about what a pack of
22:27
Speaker 1: cigarettes cost today compared to ten years ago. It's like
22:32
Speaker 1: I think in in say New York, it's probably about
22:35
Speaker 1: twelve times more than before. Um, I know, like almost
22:39
Speaker 1: overnight after the tobacco settlement was settled, tobacco prices doubled
22:46
Speaker 1: just from the added tax. But uh, tobacco use has
22:51
Speaker 1: gone down, like went down like from like two seven
22:55
Speaker 1: due to the price, or they believe it's due to
22:58
Speaker 1: the price, probably also due to public education, but really
23:01
Speaker 1: they were educating the public before than anyway. So yes,
23:05
Speaker 1: they think that it has to do with the the
23:07
Speaker 1: fact that the tobacco Settlement led to just ridiculously higher
23:11
Speaker 1: taxes and still continues to. So you can say that
23:14
Speaker 1: there's a model that Okay, if you just keep adding
23:18
Speaker 1: more and more and more money in the form of
23:21
Speaker 1: attacks to this item, eventually everybody's going to fall off, right,
23:25
Speaker 1: you will reach that point where no one will pay
23:28
Speaker 1: that any longer. What we were talking about, where where
23:32
Speaker 1: you're actually taxing the consumer. That's different. That's saying I'm
23:37
Speaker 1: whether you eat terribly or not until you get down
23:42
Speaker 1: to a certain what body mass index or whatever. Um,
23:46
Speaker 1: you have to pay more for health insurance. I almost
23:50
Speaker 1: feel like it should be the other way around, like
23:53
Speaker 1: car insurance, like you get breaks if you're a good driver,
23:56
Speaker 1: like maybe if set up in centiplans, if you lose weight,
24:00
Speaker 1: then you get lower costs, right, be nice to lower
24:03
Speaker 1: costs for a change, it would be, But it's ultimately
24:06
Speaker 1: the same thing. It's just a different way of looking
24:07
Speaker 1: at it. The people who aren't losing weight or paying
24:10
Speaker 1: they're paying more than other people. But I see what
24:12
Speaker 1: you're saying. It's starting out at level and then um,
24:15
Speaker 1: people who are better at something get or who do
24:18
Speaker 1: well pay less. Yeah, it's it seems fair. There's some problems,
24:23
Speaker 1: so like how do you how do you keep track
24:25
Speaker 1: of that, keep track of the individual? Yeah? And yeah,
24:30
Speaker 1: I mean how often can do you have to Like,
24:32
Speaker 1: if you lose a significant amount of weight, do you
24:34
Speaker 1: go in and say, hey, I need a letter from
24:37
Speaker 1: you saying like I can get a reduction in my
24:39
Speaker 1: insurance now because I've hit this goal or whatever. You know,
24:43
Speaker 1: run it through your doctor and you know, have a
24:46
Speaker 1: have a standardized form where they take certain measurements and
24:51
Speaker 1: if you want to, if you want to apply and
24:53
Speaker 1: get the cheaper rates, then it's up to you to
24:56
Speaker 1: get those sheets filled out and turn them in every
24:58
Speaker 1: six months. I think you may have just all the
25:00
Speaker 1: big problem that makes sense to me. Well, um, in
25:04
Speaker 1: Japan they're doing something like that. It's called the Matabo
25:06
Speaker 1: program uh where every year everybody goes in for an
25:10
Speaker 1: annual check up anyway, and they do it through their employer.
25:13
Speaker 1: They added some sort of like body mass index measurement
25:16
Speaker 1: now too. You know, there's like for the person there's
25:19
Speaker 1: no financial steak in losing weight or getting a target weight, um,
25:24
Speaker 1: but there's a lot of societal and peer pressure from
25:28
Speaker 1: their employer who's getting pressured from their city or county
25:32
Speaker 1: or town which is getting hit financially for for X
25:36
Speaker 1: number of people that are not losing weight. Um. So
25:40
Speaker 1: they're using like this societal pressure to pressure people because
25:45
Speaker 1: the Japanese no shame. And we'll see that was that
25:48
Speaker 1: would work for me because I'm overweight. And if I
25:51
Speaker 1: guarantee you if every time they rang up something, if
25:54
Speaker 1: a a little speaker at the regishore went fat tax,
25:57
Speaker 1: fat tax, like stop buying those things or I would
26:02
Speaker 1: you know, find out a way to get them on
26:04
Speaker 1: the black market. Well, I think a lot of people
26:06
Speaker 1: wouldn't for sure. Yeah, that would shame me that that's
26:09
Speaker 1: what they should do. I'm amending my previous statement, they
26:12
Speaker 1: should have a computer voice that yells out fat decks
26:14
Speaker 1: every time you buy something fat. Why not just combine
26:16
Speaker 1: both of those. Let's combine boat, because then I think
26:19
Speaker 1: you have a powerhouse. Mother. And this is coming from
26:21
Speaker 1: the guy it's like thirty pounds overweight. Sometimes we have
26:25
Speaker 1: the best ideas. I can tell you, though, seeing um
26:27
Speaker 1: like on a um like a restaurant's menu board, seeing
26:31
Speaker 1: the calories next to it, that definitely has an effect
26:34
Speaker 1: on my behavior for sure. Ah apparently anyway, it's not
26:40
Speaker 1: like but seeing it, like, yeah, that's really nine calories.
26:43
Speaker 1: I don't feel like that right now. Yeah, I guess,
26:47
Speaker 1: so it doesn't for me. I guess I'm never fooling
26:49
Speaker 1: myself into thinking that that fried chicken doesn't have that
26:53
Speaker 1: many calories, but maybe seeing it, Yeah, I get you. Yeah,
26:57
Speaker 1: I guess if I think about it, I'm like, well, yeah,
26:58
Speaker 1: fried chicken has that many lari But you think about
27:01
Speaker 1: it if you see it. Yeah, Okay, So what do
27:04
Speaker 1: what do Americans sink? If you believe this pole One
27:07
Speaker 1: in three believed that obese people should pay more taxes
27:11
Speaker 1: than healthy weight people, and this is conducted by the
27:14
Speaker 1: Phalanx Investment Partners LLC. Uh and uh, boy, he's got
27:20
Speaker 1: a lot of he asked a lot of questions in here,
27:22
Speaker 1: he's got a lot of stats. Um, he does find
27:27
Speaker 1: an interesting and I two that, uh, the obese could
27:31
Speaker 1: garner support by Americans where overweight. So what that means
27:37
Speaker 1: is thirty of overweight people or even saying yes they
27:42
Speaker 1: should be tax or they should pay more for health care.
27:46
Speaker 1: It makes he used the terrible, terrible analogy, Um, should
27:51
Speaker 1: we allow short sighted or nearsighted people to become lion tamers?
27:58
Speaker 1: And he's he's basically impairing that. But that kind of
28:01
Speaker 1: um brings up a larger question like is this habit?
28:06
Speaker 1: Is it just poor habits and poor eating behavior eating patterns?
28:12
Speaker 1: And if so, then yeah, this guy can make a
28:14
Speaker 1: pretty good case that, yeah, we need to break people's
28:17
Speaker 1: bad eating habits, especially if they're passing them along to
28:20
Speaker 1: their kids. Well. Interestingly, younger people responded generally uh more
28:27
Speaker 1: in favor of taxing food more than older adults, and
28:31
Speaker 1: people of higher income responded more positively to a fat
28:35
Speaker 1: tax quote unquote yeah then obviously people with a lower income,
28:39
Speaker 1: So yeah, wholesome weight terrible that I didn't mean that
28:44
Speaker 1: like that. So this is all kind of theoretical right here.
28:48
Speaker 1: I mean, what, Richmond, California might have a one sense
28:51
Speaker 1: soda tax, but they'd be the only city with that.
28:54
Speaker 1: Other places have tried at New York tried the same thing, um,
28:58
Speaker 1: but apparently the soda come Benese shouted it down as
29:03
Speaker 1: a um naked money grab, cleverly disguised as a health policy.
29:08
Speaker 1: That's sad. It sucks from lobbyists get their meat hooks
29:13
Speaker 1: and stuff, um and things like money grab. But if
29:15
Speaker 1: you go to Hungary or Denmark, hungry is it's awesome
29:19
Speaker 1: that they have a fat tax because of the country's name.
29:22
Speaker 1: But um, if you go to Hungary, your Denmark, um,
29:26
Speaker 1: there are fat taxes instituted there. Hungry has one that's
29:30
Speaker 1: like a flat thirty point thirty seven euro tax um
29:36
Speaker 1: on anything that's unhealthy. And I'm not quite sure what
29:40
Speaker 1: the parameters are, but basically dunk food what we consider here.
29:44
Speaker 1: And then Denmark just instituted something to where um they
29:49
Speaker 1: tax saturated fats in um foods to the tune of
29:55
Speaker 1: like sixteen kroner a kilogram, which comes out to be
29:57
Speaker 1: like a dollar twenty nine a pound and then divide
30:00
Speaker 1: it up and they take into account not just what
30:03
Speaker 1: ends up in the end result of the fat, but
30:06
Speaker 1: how much fat is also put in and maybe lost
30:08
Speaker 1: along the way. Interesting, So they're really going after it. Yeah,
30:11
Speaker 1: I like. I like the companies that incentivized, like our
30:14
Speaker 1: own Discovery Channel will pay for half of your stomach
30:18
Speaker 1: stapling gym membership. Uh, which is great, Like make a
30:23
Speaker 1: little cheaper to join the gym. Can't make you go
30:26
Speaker 1: to the gym, but you feel like a sucker when
30:29
Speaker 1: you're paying to go to the gym and don't go
30:30
Speaker 1: to the gym. I forgot that they'll do that. I
30:33
Speaker 1: need to take them up on that. Oh yeah, dude,
30:35
Speaker 1: it's once you just missed the deadline. But it's a
30:38
Speaker 1: quarter your gym membership for you any me? Really? Yeah, wow,
30:44
Speaker 1: that's great. I totally forgot about that. And it's not
30:48
Speaker 1: the most money in the world, but a few shekels
30:50
Speaker 1: makes you feel good. Yeah. I will definitely take them
30:53
Speaker 1: up and thank you for reminding me each other. Well,
30:55
Speaker 1: next time my reminder pops up, I'll remind you. How
30:57
Speaker 1: about that, I'll go start it today. Um let's see.
31:01
Speaker 1: But yes, please do remind me, just because it will
31:03
Speaker 1: make me feel good that you remember. Um, I guess
31:06
Speaker 1: that's about it. Bat taxes, they're all over the place
31:09
Speaker 1: in Europe. They're spreading their their way west. Yeah. Maybe
31:13
Speaker 1: let's see. If you want to learn more about the
31:15
Speaker 1: proposals for the fat tax, you can type in fat
31:18
Speaker 1: tax and the search part at how stuff works dot com.
31:20
Speaker 1: That will bring up an article written by Jeopardy winner
31:24
Speaker 1: Jacob Silverman. Yeah, Jacob, I watched all three of those shows.
31:28
Speaker 1: He won twice. He won three times before. Right, Well,
31:33
Speaker 1: he's coming back. They had to suspend for like they do,
31:36
Speaker 1: like the tournament or something. Huh, so he'll be back
31:38
Speaker 1: at some point to continue his run. That is awesome. Yeah,
31:41
Speaker 1: and I never even knew the guy, but um, he
31:43
Speaker 1: was really nice to me when I first got hired, Like,
31:46
Speaker 1: uh we he emailed me a bunch and kind of
31:48
Speaker 1: like helped me out early on. And then I saw
31:51
Speaker 1: him on tvails Like so that's what Jacob Silverman woks like,
31:54
Speaker 1: Oh you never saw him high. I never even saw him.
31:56
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, he was a neat guy. Um yeah, we'll congret.
32:00
Speaker 1: Listen to Jacob. Also, if you want to learn about
32:02
Speaker 1: b D d Um. You can type in into the
32:05
Speaker 1: search bar and that will bring up an article by M. E.
32:08
Speaker 1: E UM. And I said searchbar in there somewhere, which
32:12
Speaker 1: means it's time for listener mail. So Chuck, sorry, I
32:18
Speaker 1: know that normally we should be doing listener mail here,
32:21
Speaker 1: but let's let's tell everybody something, okay, So um iTunes
32:26
Speaker 1: it's cool enough to say, hey, guys, what entertainment podcast
32:31
Speaker 1: is your favorite entertainment you said? They put in quotes, um,
32:34
Speaker 1: and uh they there's us. There's competition. Stiff dude, US,
32:40
Speaker 1: Ted Talks, Discovery News, Um, Freakonomics, Radio Lab, Radio Lab Dude.
32:48
Speaker 1: We're up against Radio Lab right now? Um? Is that
32:51
Speaker 1: all of them? I don't want to leave anybody out.
32:53
Speaker 1: Very great podcast I can't remember, but yeah, we're up
32:57
Speaker 1: against some heavy hitters, so we are so um. They
33:00
Speaker 1: created a poll on the iTunes Facebook page. So you
33:03
Speaker 1: can go to iTunes on Facebook and if you look
33:06
Speaker 1: on their wall and go down, UM, let's see I
33:11
Speaker 1: don't know a few posts. You're gonna see that that
33:14
Speaker 1: you know, what entertainment podcasts do you like the most? Right?
33:18
Speaker 1: You can go vote for us if you want. Indeed,
33:21
Speaker 1: that would be very nice. We think that would be
33:23
Speaker 1: sweet if you did. If not, it's cool. We you're
33:25
Speaker 1: listening anyway, We know you like us, and we won't
33:28
Speaker 1: extort anything from you. Um, but if you're having trouble
33:31
Speaker 1: finding it, here's the U R l H T T
33:35
Speaker 1: P S colon slash slash www dot facebook dot com.
33:41
Speaker 1: You should probably go get a pain. Wait is that
33:44
Speaker 1: in the oral okay slash questions? That's plural slash one
33:50
Speaker 1: zero one five one zero one five zero seven one
33:57
Speaker 1: two four five eight zero three slash. That's right, And
34:06
Speaker 1: you can go vote for us if you want to
34:08
Speaker 1: vote for us. You can also go vote for Ted Talk.
34:10
Speaker 1: You can vote for whoever you want. But we just
34:12
Speaker 1: think it was a nice thing that they did, and
34:14
Speaker 1: we'd about to be featured and oh yeah we left
34:17
Speaker 1: that part out. Whoever wins gets featured on the iTunes
34:19
Speaker 1: home page on June. Yeah. Anyway, good check it out
34:25
Speaker 1: and if you're if you're unfamiliar with iTunes, check that
34:28
Speaker 1: out too. Um, Josh, I'm gonna call this uh pediatrician.
34:34
Speaker 1: Uh follow up with Marinol. Remember in our Medical Marijuana podcast,
34:39
Speaker 1: we talked about the synthetic pill Marin all that you
34:42
Speaker 1: can get a prescription for guys. I'm a huge fan,
34:46
Speaker 1: and I even followed and said hi to Josh once
34:48
Speaker 1: in Macy's Atlenox Malling. Oh yeah, yes, yes, you know
34:55
Speaker 1: this guy. I remember that guy. Yeah, Jimmy, Jimmy the doctor.
34:57
Speaker 1: I didn't realize Jimmy was a pediatrician. He is. By
35:00
Speaker 1: the way, I had a fan encounter at uh the
35:02
Speaker 1: grocery store without my tooth in the other day, to
35:06
Speaker 1: embarrassing No, I like, I don't think you noticed, but
35:10
Speaker 1: I think I came across as odd because I was
35:13
Speaker 1: acting real funny because I didn't have my tooth then
35:16
Speaker 1: I didn't want to smile real big, so I was
35:18
Speaker 1: kinda like, nice to meet you. Anyway. I'm a huge
35:24
Speaker 1: fan from Jimmy, and I was particularly interested in Chuck's
35:28
Speaker 1: hesitancy and saying he had taken a Mariano pilled before,
35:31
Speaker 1: since it's a legitimate prescription drug. H While one doesn't
35:35
Speaker 1: normally associate medical marijuana with the under eighteen year old crowd,
35:39
Speaker 1: the use of marianal is not uncommon. Actually in our
35:42
Speaker 1: pediatric oncology patients undergoing chemotherapy, and we use it as
35:46
Speaker 1: a second or third line of anti nasea drug. However,
35:49
Speaker 1: in children who are unresponsive to those medications, marian All
35:52
Speaker 1: is safe and awful, highly effective alternative. That being said,
35:56
Speaker 1: you'd be surprised at the number of parents who are
35:59
Speaker 1: hesitant or who even blatantly refused to allow their child
36:02
Speaker 1: to take mayor and all because of the stigma associated
36:05
Speaker 1: with it being quote from marijuana. Uh. This normally leads
36:09
Speaker 1: into a conversation describing the fact that many of our
36:11
Speaker 1: medicines are created based off of street drugs. Like you
36:14
Speaker 1: guys mentioned the derivation of the very commonly used morphine
36:17
Speaker 1: from heroin. I'd say fifty to sixty in the time
36:21
Speaker 1: we can convince the parent to allow us to help
36:23
Speaker 1: their child. However, again, it's certainly not uncommon for them
36:27
Speaker 1: to refuse. It's incredibly frustrating, let me tell you, especially
36:30
Speaker 1: when a child is clearly suffering because of their parents hardheadedness.
36:35
Speaker 1: But we ultimately have to respect their opinions and their wishes. UH.
36:39
Speaker 1: Doctors who house he doesn't respect anybody's opinions or wishes.
36:45
Speaker 1: He just hammers through the best treatment he can think of.
36:48
Speaker 1: I just thought you guys may find that aspect of
36:50
Speaker 1: the social stigma associated with mayor and all. Uh interesting,
36:53
Speaker 1: thanks for doing the topic. It's when that comes up
36:55
Speaker 1: frequently in my circles, and that is Dr Jimmy. Thanks
36:58
Speaker 1: Dr Jimmy. I totally we remember you. That was that.
37:01
Speaker 1: That was nice. That made my day that one time. UM.
37:04
Speaker 1: Umi was very impressed. Yeah, and uh, let's see, UM,
37:09
Speaker 1: if you have an opinion on the fat attacks, I'm
37:15
Speaker 1: sure there are plenty. I'm pretty sure we would get
37:18
Speaker 1: them even without asking, but let's go ahead and ask.
37:20
Speaker 1: Make sure everybody feels comfortable telling us what they think. UM,
37:24
Speaker 1: be nice, but we want to hear about it. You
37:26
Speaker 1: can tweet to us at s y s K podcast.
37:29
Speaker 1: UM We're on Facebook at Facebook dot com slash stuff
37:32
Speaker 1: you should Know, and you can email us at stuff
37:35
Speaker 1: Podcasts at Discovery dot com for more on this and
37:44
Speaker 1: thousands of other topics. Is it how Stuff works dot com.
37:54
Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
37:57
Speaker 1: It's ready, are you