Preferences regarding behavioral policy: Attitudes toward sugary beverage taxes in the US

Tobias König and Renke Schmacker

Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Market Behavior from WZB Berlin Social Science Center

Abstract: Using surveys and experiments, we provide evidence on how people think about and justify sugar-sweetened-beverage (SSB) taxes, a widely discussed behavioral policy intervention. We show that motives to correct internalities and behavioral biases impact policy preferences almost as much as standard externality reasoning. However, antipaternalistic attitudes explain why many people oppose SSB taxes although they acknowledge the relevance of behavioral biases. We demonstrate that instructional explanations about how behavioral SSB taxes work significantly increase support for such taxes. By contrast, simple information feedback regarding the statistical prevalence of internalities and externalities has no effect. Our findings suggest that the nature of information provision-particularly explaining a policy's goals and mechanisms-is crucial for enhancing its acceptability.

Keywords: Paternalism; sin tax; internality; externality; soda tax; self-control (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 D78 H23 I18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:wzbmbh:328006

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