[wpietri]

Hi! Thanks for the detailed reply. I see where things got confused.

> You pointed to the efficacy of cigarette taxes in clear support of the Prop E tax

No, I didn't.

You wrote "So a tax that is regressive represents 'progress'?"

I replied to that by giving an example of a regressive tax that represents progress. That's all. Your comment struck me as annoyingly glib, constructing a false contradiction through word games. Since cigarette taxes have been so successful, I thought it was a good counterexample to the false contradiction. Everything else you write is about what you read into my statement, not what I said.

But to address your point:

I agree that a sugary beverage tax in San Francisco could lead to substitution and no net health gain. But A) the circumstances are different enough (and the original sample size is small enough) that I'm happy to try it out to see what happens, and B) if it doesn't work like the proponents hope, I think that's fine because humans often have to try the obvious thing before they will try the less obvious thing.