IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/itaxpf/v29y2022i5d10.1007_s10797-021-09704-y.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Taxation of unhealthy food consumption and the intensive versus extensive margin of obesity

Author

Listed:
  • Zarko Y. Kalamov

    (University of Technology Berlin, CESifo)

  • Marco Runkel

    (University of Technology Berlin, CESifo, NoCeT)

Abstract

If an individual’s health costs are U-shaped in weight with a minimum at some healthy level and if the individual has both self-control problems and rational motives for over- or underweight, the optimal paternalistic tax on calorie intake mitigates the individual’s weight problem (intensive margin), but does not induce the individual to choose healthy weight (extensive margin). Implementing healthy weight by a calorie tax is not only inferior to paternalistic taxation, but may even be worse than not taxing the individual at all. With heterogeneous individuals, the optimal uniform paternalistic tax may have the negative side effect of reducing calorie intake of the under- and normal weights. We confirm these theoretical insights by an empirical calibration to US adults.

Suggested Citation

  • Zarko Y. Kalamov & Marco Runkel, 2022. "Taxation of unhealthy food consumption and the intensive versus extensive margin of obesity," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 29(5), pages 1294-1320, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:itaxpf:v:29:y:2022:i:5:d:10.1007_s10797-021-09704-y
    DOI: 10.1007/s10797-021-09704-y
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10797-021-09704-y
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10797-021-09704-y?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andersen, Steffen & Harrison, Glenn W. & Lau, Morten I. & Rutström, E. Elisabet, 2014. "Discounting behavior: A reconsideration," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 15-33.
    2. David M. Cutler & Edward L. Glaeser & Jesse M. Shapiro, 2003. "Why Have Americans Become More Obese?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 17(3), pages 93-118, Summer.
    3. Loewenstein, George & Chater, Nick, 2017. "Putting nudges in perspective," Behavioural Public Policy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 26-53, May.
    4. Dragone, Davide, 2009. "A rational eating model of binges, diets and obesity," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 799-804, July.
    5. Haavio, Markus & Kotakorpi, Kaisa, 2016. "Sin licenses revisited," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 40-51.
    6. Levy, Amnon, 2002. "Rational eating: can it lead to overweightness or underweightness?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(5), pages 887-899, September.
    7. Cremer, Helmuth & Goulão, Catarina & Roeder, Kerstin, 2016. "Earmarking and the political support of fat taxes," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 258-267.
    8. Helmuth Cremer & Philippe De Donder & Darío Maldonado & Pierre Pestieau, 2012. "Taxing Sin Goods and Subsidizing Health Care," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 114(1), pages 101-123, March.
    9. Hunt Allcott & Benjamin B Lockwood & Dmitry Taubinsky, 2019. "Regressive Sin Taxes, with an Application to the Optimal Soda Tax," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 134(3), pages 1557-1626.
    10. Ted O'Donoghue & Matthew Rabin, 2003. "Studying Optimal Paternalism, Illustrated by a Model of Sin Taxes," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(2), pages 186-191, May.
    11. Dragone, Davide & Savorelli, Luca, 2012. "Thinness and obesity: A model of food consumption, health concerns, and social pressure," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 243-256.
    12. Zarko Kalamov, 2020. "A sales tax is better at promoting healthy diets than the fat tax and the thin subsidy," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(3), pages 353-366, March.
    13. Hunt Allcott & Benjamin B. Lockwood & Dmitry Taubinsky, 2019. "Should We Tax Sugar-Sweetened Beverages? An Overview of Theory and Evidence," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 33(3), pages 202-227, Summer.
    14. Haavio, Markus & Kotakorpi, Kaisa, 2011. "The political economy of sin taxes," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(4), pages 575-594, May.
    15. Ikeda, Shinsuke & Kang, Myong-Il & Ohtake, Fumio, 2010. "Hyperbolic discounting, the sign effect, and the body mass index," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(2), pages 268-284, March.
    16. Harding, Matthew & Lovenheim, Michael, 2017. "The effect of prices on nutrition: Comparing the impact of product- and nutrient-specific taxes," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 53-71.
    17. Jonathan Gruber & Botond Köszegi, 2001. "Is Addiction "Rational"? Theory and Evidence," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(4), pages 1261-1303.
    18. Becker, Gary S & Murphy, Kevin M, 1988. "A Theory of Rational Addiction," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 96(4), pages 675-700, August.
    19. David Laibson, 1997. "Golden Eggs and Hyperbolic Discounting," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(2), pages 443-478.
    20. Luis Rodrigo Arnabal, 2021. "Optimal design of sin taxes in the presence of nontaxable sin goods," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(7), pages 1580-1599, July.
    21. Zarko Kalamov & Marco Runkel, 2020. "Present-Focused Preferences and Sin Goods Consumption at the Extensive and Intensive Margins," CESifo Working Paper Series 8237, CESifo.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Thomas Eichner & Marco Runkel, 2022. "Non-Paternalistic Foundation of Sugar Taxation and Missing Markets for Sugar Content," CESifo Working Paper Series 9583, CESifo.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Maria Alessandra Antonelli & Valeria De Bonis & Angelo Castaldo & Alessandrao Gandolfo, 2022. "Sin goods taxation: an encompassing model," Public Finance Research Papers 52, Istituto di Economia e Finanza, DSGE, Sapienza University of Rome.
    2. Justina Klimaviciute, 2024. "(No) time to be healthy: Optimal policy with time and monetary investments in health," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 33(3), pages 410-431, March.
    3. Zarko Kalamov & Marco Runkel, 2018. "Paternalistic Taxation of Unhealthy Food and the Intensive versus Extensive Margin of Obesity," CESifo Working Paper Series 6911, CESifo.
    4. Luis Rodrigo Arnabal, 2021. "Optimal design of sin taxes in the presence of nontaxable sin goods," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(7), pages 1580-1599, July.
    5. Zarko Kalamov, 2020. "A sales tax is better at promoting healthy diets than the fat tax and the thin subsidy," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(3), pages 353-366, March.
    6. Liu, Yaqin & Ferreira, Susana & Colson, Gregory & Wetzstein, Michael, 2013. "Obesity and Counseling," 2013 Annual Meeting, August 4-6, 2013, Washington, D.C. 149947, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    7. Davide, Dragone & Francesco, Manaresi & Luca, Savorelli, 2013. "Obesity and smoking: can we catch two birds with one tax?," SIRE Discussion Papers 2013-31, Scottish Institute for Research in Economics (SIRE).
    8. Giovanni Immordino & Anna Maria C. Menichini & Maria Grazia Romano, 2022. "Education, taxation and the perceived effects of sin good consumption," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 29(4), pages 985-1013, August.
    9. Cremer, Helmuth & Goulão, Catarina & Roeder, Kerstin, 2016. "Earmarking and the political support of fat taxes," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 258-267.
    10. Renke Schmacker & Sinne Smed, 2023. "Sin Taxes and Self-Control," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 15(3), pages 1-34, August.
    11. Alberto Pench, 2020. "Time Allocation and Snacks and Sugar Sweetened Beverages Taxation," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 6(3), pages 469-492, November.
    12. Davide Dragone & Francesco Manaresi & Luca Savorelli, 2016. "Obesity and Smoking: can we Kill Two Birds with one Tax?," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(11), pages 1464-1482, November.
    13. Alberto Pench, 0. "Time Allocation and Snacks and Sugar Sweetened Beverages Taxation," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 0, pages 1-24.
    14. Kamila Danilowicz-Gösele & Robert Schwager, 2016. "Subsidizing Health-Conscious Behavior Now or Later," CESifo Working Paper Series 5734, CESifo.
    15. Miura, Takahiro, 2019. "Does time preference affect smoking behavior? A dynamic panel analysis," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 170-180.
    16. Pierre Pestieau & Gregory Ponthiere, 2012. "Myopia, regrets, and risky behaviors," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 19(2), pages 288-317, April.
    17. Arni, Patrick & Dragone, Davide & Goette, Lorenz & Ziebarth, Nicolas R., 2021. "Biased health perceptions and risky health behaviors—Theory and evidence," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    18. Helmuth Cremer & Catarina Goulão & Jean-Marie Lozachmeur, 2019. "Soda tax incidence and design under monopoly," CESifo Working Paper Series 7525, CESifo.
    19. Bossi, Luca & Calcott, Paul & Petkov, Vladimir, 2013. "Optimal tax rules and addictive consumption," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 984-1000.
    20. Richards, Timothy J. & Hamilton, Stephen F., 2012. "Obesity and Hyperbolic Discounting: An Experimental Analysis," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 37(2), pages 1-18, August.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:itaxpf:v:29:y:2022:i:5:d:10.1007_s10797-021-09704-y. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.