IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/crpeac/v88y2022ics1045235421000459.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The role of regressive sugar tax in the soft drink industry levy (SDIL): A Marxist analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Young, Amanda
  • James, Kieran
  • Hassan, Abeer

Abstract

Simmering beneath the bubbles of your regular soft drink are the issues of social class, subjugation, and social injustice. Sugar is a commodity and it is this component when added to soft drinks that now attracts a taxation liability under the Soft Drinks Industry Levy (SDIL) which was introduced in the UK in April 2018. In this critical taxation article, we argue that the UK’s capitalist state is using the excuse of concern with workers’ health to justify taxing a commodity, which is at best an authoritarian attempt to manage people’s behaviour to make it more conducive to capitalism, but will fail; add to economic inequality and inequity; and is therefore, morally delinquent.

Suggested Citation

  • Young, Amanda & James, Kieran & Hassan, Abeer, 2022. "The role of regressive sugar tax in the soft drink industry levy (SDIL): A Marxist analysis," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:crpeac:v:88:y:2022:i:c:s1045235421000459
    DOI: 10.1016/j.cpa.2021.102326
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1045235421000459
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.cpa.2021.102326?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. Lew Perren & Peter L. Jennings, 2005. "Government Discourses on Entrepreneurship: Issues of Legitimization, Subjugation, and Power," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 29(2), pages 173-184, March.
    2. Bramble,Tom, 2008. "Trade Unionism in Australia," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521888035.
    3. Jeacle, Ingrid, 2016. "The diet of the nation: The state, family budgets and the 1930s nutritional crisis in Britain," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 54-68.
    4. Bramble,Tom, 2008. "Trade Unionism in Australia," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521716123.
    5. Wynter, Carlene Beth & Oats, Lynne, 2018. "Don’t worry, we are not after you! Anancy culture and tax enforcement in Jamaica," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 56-69.
    6. repec:eme:aaaj00:aaaj-11-2019-4251 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Apostol, Oana & Pop, Alina, 2019. "‘Paying taxes is losing money’: A qualitative study on institutional logics in the tax consultancy field in Romania," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 1-23.
    8. Cooper, Christine & Danson, Mike & Whittam, Geoff & Sheridan, Tommy, 2010. "The neoliberal project—Local taxation intervention in Scotland," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 195-210.
    9. Bujaki, Merridee L. & Gaudet, Stéphanie & Iuliano, Rosa M., 2017. "Governmentality and identity construction through 50 years of personal income tax returns: The case of an immigrant couple in Canada," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 54-74.
    10. Armstrong, Peter, 2015. "The discourse of Michel Foucault: A sociological encounter," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 29-42.
    11. Bruno Jossa, 2014. "Marx, Lenin and the Cooperative Movement," Review of Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 26(2), pages 282-302, April.
    12. Kieran James & Susan P. Briggs & Eunice M. James, 2011. "Raskolnikov speaks today: Marxism and alienation in Fyodor Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment and the implications for business ethics education," International Journal of Critical Accounting, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 3(4), pages 321-349.
    13. Bruno Jossa, 2005. "Marx, Marxism and the cooperative movement," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 29(1), pages 3-18, January.
    14. Jane Andrew & Max Baker, 2020. "For emancipation: a Marxist critique of structure within critical realism," Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 33(3), pages 641-653, February.
    15. Jenny Kwai-Sim Leung & Kieran James & Ahmad Sujan, 2011. "From building site warriors to Korean church: radical strategic realignment in Sydney's construction union," International Journal of Economics and Accounting, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 2(4), pages 387-416.
    16. Gallhofer, Sonja & Haslam, Jim, 2019. "Some reflections on the construct of emancipatory accounting: Shifting meaning and the possibilities of a new pragmatism," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    17. Cooper, Christine, 2015. "Accounting for the fictitious: A Marxist contribution to understanding accounting's roles in the financial crisis," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 63-82.
    18. Jou, Judy & Techakehakij, Win, 2012. "International application of sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) taxation in obesity reduction: Factors that may influence policy effectiveness in country-specific contexts," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 107(1), pages 83-90.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Argilés-Bosch, Josep Mª & Ravenda, Diego & Garcia-Blandón, Josep, 2021. "E-commerce and labour tax avoidance," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    2. Stacchezzini, Riccardo & Masiero, Eleonora & Lai, Alessandro, 2023. "Histories as counter-accounting," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    3. Jenny Kwai‐Sim Leung & Kieran James & Razvan V. Mustata & Carmen Giorgiana Bonaci, 2010. "Trade union strategy in Sydney's construction union: a Roman Catholic perspective," International Journal of Social Economics, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 37(7), pages 488-511, June.
    4. Bayari, Celal, 2010. "Japanese Hybrid Factories in Australia: Analysing Labor Relations and Reflecting on the Work of Tetsuo Abo," MPRA Paper 101832, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 01 Feb 2010.
    5. Greg Sharzer, 2017. "Cooperatives as Transitional Economics," Review of Radical Political Economics, Union for Radical Political Economics, vol. 49(3), pages 456-476, September.
    6. Cooper, Christine, 2015. "Entrepreneurs of the self: The development of management control since 1976," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 14-24.
    7. Edmund Heery, 2015. "Unions and the organising turn: Reflections after 20 years of Organising Works," The Economic and Labour Relations Review, , vol. 26(4), pages 545-560, December.
    8. Annisette, Marcia & Prasad, Ajnesh, 2017. "Critical accounting research in hyper-racial times," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 5-19.
    9. Andrew, Jane & Baker, Max & Huang, Casey, 2023. "Data breaches in the age of surveillance capitalism: Do disclosures have a new role to play?," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    10. Alison Barnes & Raymond Markey, 2015. "Evaluating the organising model of trade unionism: An Australian perspective," The Economic and Labour Relations Review, , vol. 26(4), pages 513-525, December.
    11. Bo Yang & Xin Huang & Qin Liu & Shenglan Tang & Mary Story & Yiwen Chen & Maigeng Zhou, 2020. "Child Nutrition Trends Over the Past Two Decades and Challenges for Achieving Nutrition SDGs and National Targets in China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(4), pages 1-12, February.
    12. Islam, Muhammad Azizul & Deegan, Craig & Haque, Shamima, 2021. "Corporate human rights performance and moral power: A study of retail MNCs’ supply chains in Bangladesh," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    13. Bonnet, Céline & Réquillart, Vincent, 2023. "The effects of taxation on the individual consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 51(C).
    14. Erik Lundmark & Anna Krzeminska & Dean A. Shepherd, 2019. "Images of Entrepreneurship: Exploring Root Metaphors and Expanding Upon Them," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 43(1), pages 138-170, January.
    15. Alsukait, Reem & Bleich, Sara & Wilde, Parke & Singh, Gitanjali & Folta, Sara, 2020. "Sugary drink excise tax policy process and implementation: Case study from Saudi Arabia," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    16. Maran, Laura & Bracci, Enrico & Funnell, Warwick, 2016. "Accounting and the management of power: Napoleon’s occupation of the commune of Ferrara (1796–1799)," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 60-78.
    17. Navarra Cecilia & Tortia Ermanno, 2011. "Employer’s moral hazard and the emergence of worker cooperatives," Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis. Working Papers 201103, University of Turin.
    18. Juan Carlos Caro & Shu Wen Ng & Ricardo Bonilla & Jorge Tovar & Barry M Popkin, 2017. "Sugary drinks taxation, projected consumption and fiscal revenues in Colombia: Evidence from a QUAIDS model," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(12), pages 1-16, December.
    19. Zhang, Ying & Andrew, Jane, 2022. "Financialisation and the Conceptual Framework: An update," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    20. Adu, Derick T. & Li, Wenying & Sawadgo, Wendiam P.M., 2023. "Estimating the unintended impact of the North American free trade agreement on U.S. public health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 333(C).

    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:eee:crpeac:v:88:y:2022:i:c:s1045235421000459. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/critical-perspectives-on-accounting/ .

    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.