Back in the day, very few restaurants would give free refills. Now, virtually all do. And as a result, you and I pay $2 for a nickel’s worth of coke or tea.

My question then is: if we were to have a government program to fix this problem, what would the end result be ?

(Heck, we can even have a summit on it if need be )

[QUOTE=Answerman]The answer from LA government would be to raise the price of the tea and coke by a dollar, but limit the number of refills to one. Then run an ad in the paper saying “Free drink refill with meals to the first
100 customers. “ but don’t disclose the limit.

How’d I do?

Hah ! Yeah, that’d be about what our state government would do. Then someone like a Bob Odom would be supplying the drinks, get a tax subsidy to do so, and he’d get his employees to ship the drinks to his home.

[QUOTE=Answerman]The answer from LA government would be to raise the price of the tea and coke by a dollar, but limit the number of refills to one. Then run an ad in the paper saying “Free drink refill with meals to the first
100 customers. “ but don’t disclose the limit.

How’d I do?

If government would get involved then their solution would be price caps on cokes. Since this is a product that is important enough for government to get involved, the solution then would require government to not allow businesses to discriminate against low income people, thus requiring soda jerks to sell their product at an affordable rate. Since the increase demand would result in less profit, the cost of Sodas would increase causing government to get involved even more. We would see the Democrats take the position of Socialized soft drink-care for the elderly and poor, which the Republicans will oppose until they took control of congress.

That won’t deter the Democrats though because now the middle class can’t afford Soda drinks. The Democrats would clamour for universal soft drink care for all citizens and demand the rich pay more because they could afford it.

Again, the Republicans would oppose it until they got into power and then try to steal this issue from the Democrats, who will at this time oppose it until they got back into power and demanded that chips also come automatically with Sodas.

Pretty soon, we’d have a soda pop addiction problem in which the government will need to solve and would have a sin tax on all soft drinks because it isn’t healthy. Governments would also sue the soft drink industry for monopolizing the drink market and costing the country billions in tax dollars.

There would be a big proganda campaign much like we currently see against the fast food industry, have seen against both the tobacco and gun industry and anybody seen drinking a soft drink would be looked down upon by their fellow citizens.

How did I do?

[QUOTE=Avman]If government would get involved then their solution would be price caps on cokes. Since this is a product that is important enough for government to get involved, the solution then would require government to not allow businesses to discriminate against low income people, thus requiring soda jerks to sell their product at an affordable rate. Since the increase demand would result in less profit, the cost of Sodas would increase causing government to get involved even more. We would see the Democrats take the position of Socialized soft drink-care for the elderly and poor, which the Republicans will oppose until they took control of congress.

That won’t deter the Democrats though because now the middle class can’t afford Soda drinks. The Democrats would clamour for universal soft drink care for all citizens and demand the rich pay more because they could afford it.

Again, the Republicans would oppose it until they got into power and then try to steal this issue from the Democrats, who will at this time oppose it until they got back into power and demanded that chips also come automatically with Sodas.

Pretty soon, we’d have a soda pop addiction problem in which the government will need to solve and would have a sin tax on all soft drinks because it isn’t healthy. Governments would also sue the soft drink industry for monopolizing the drink market and costing the country billions in tax dollars.

There would be a big proganda campaign much like we currently see against the fast food industry, have seen against both the tobacco and gun industry and anybody seen drinking a soft drink would be looked down upon by their fellow citizens.

How did I do?

Good - all the liberal code words (fairness, middle class, and sin tax) were touched upon.

This is a (sort of) riddle inspired by the debate raging about the ADA. To illustrate people’s perceptions of government’s role.

[QUOTE=UnregisteredFL]Correction: Taxman and Answerman nailed it.

As a radio commentator likes to say, I’m “illustrating absurdity by being absurd.”

I dont know, I thought avmans response was pretty good. Got more into the meat of it.

Plus, it had a good rythme, and I could dance to it.

[QUOTE=TaxMan]Back in the day, very few restaurants would give free refills. Now, virtually all do. And as a result, you and I pay $2 for a nickel’s worth of coke or tea.My question then is: if we were to have a government program to fix this problem, what would the end result be? (Heck, we can even have a summit on it if need be )

This is obviously a national, not a state, “need” so the solution would be found in the US Congress.
First, the PFFSDP (People For Fair Soft Drink Prices) would arrange to appear before a committee of Congress, and amid oceans of tears, explain how they can’t afford a Coke with their burger, taco (especially aimed at the growing Latin constituancy) or fried chicken (for the benefit of the bros that eat chicken). The committee would drag fast food CEO’s before the glaring lights and berate them for their insensitive heartless corporate greed. Convinced by this testimony, a bi-partisan committee would then urge Congress to pass the “Drinks for a Dollar” legislation, to put a cap on the drinks at that level.The new agency would be funded by a 15% tax on soft drinks. It would crate an agency within the Department of Commerce, authorized to hire fifteen thousand new “drink checkers” to monitor drink prices at the nation’s fast food outlets. Some poor mom and pop burger stand owner would file a suit to question the constitutionality of Congress’ right to regulate soft drink prices, but the federal courts would easily swat that aside opinining that the sugar used in soft drinks was transported in interstate commerce, and thus the law is constitutional.
The chains, facing huge financial loses, would reduce the size of their cups to 8 ounces, but Congress, would easily pass emergency legislation to require all soft drink cups be of the 16 ounce size. FInally, the chains would give up and raise the price on their burgers, tacos and chicken by an amount needed to make up the difference.
And the poor fools that begged Congress to address this “need” would never understand what happened.
(And Jefferson, Wahsington, Madison, Adams, etc. would be thrashing about in their graves!)

[QUOTE=Charleylake]This is obviously a national, not a state, “need” so the solution would be found in the US Congress.
First, the PFFSDP (People For Fair Soft Drink Prices) would arrange to appear before a committee of Congress, and amid oceans of tears, explain how they can’t afford a Coke with their burger, taco (especially aimed at the growing Latin constituancy) or fried chicken (for the benefit of the bros that eat chicken). The committee would drag fast food CEO’s before the glaring lights and berate them for their insensitive heartless corporate greed. Convinced by this testimony, a bi-partisan committee would then urge Congress to pass the “Drinks for a Dollar” legislation, to put a cap on the drinks at that level.The new agency would be funded by a 15% tax on soft drinks. It would crate an agency within the Department of Commerce, authorized to hire fifteen thousand new “drink checkers” to monitor drink prices at the nation’s fast food outlets. Some poor mom and pop burger stand owner would file a suit to question the constitutionality of Congress’ right to regulate soft drink prices, but the federal courts would easily swat that aside opinining that the sugar used in soft drinks was transported in interstate commerce, and thus the law is constitutional.
The chains, facing huge financial loses, would reduce the size of their cups to 8 ounces, but Congress, would easily pass emergency legislation to require all soft drink cups be of the 16 ounce size. FInally, the chains would give up and raise the price on their burgers, tacos and chicken by an amount needed to make up the difference.
And the poor fools that begged Congress to address this “need” would never understand what happened.

(I had to wipe my eyes, this was so funny !)
(Good catch about it being a Federal need - that was a hidden riddle)

[QUOTE=Charleylake]but the federal courts would easily swat that aside opinining that the sugar used in soft drinks was transported in interstate commerce, and thus the law is constitutional.

Hmm, good one, I had forgotten about Article 1 Section 8 of the United States Constitution.

[QUOTE=Charleylake]The chains, facing huge financial loses, would reduce the size of their cups to 8 ounces, but Congress, would easily pass emergency legislation to require all soft drink cups be of the 16 ounce size. FInally, the chains would give up and raise the price on their burgers, tacos and chicken by an amount needed to make up the difference.
And the poor fools that begged Congress to address this “need” would never understand what happened.
(And Jefferson, Wahsington, Madison, Adams, etc. would be thrashing about in their graves!)

Exactly, the road to hell is paved with good intentions… with a large amount of selfishness.