@article{Okrent:162516,
      recid = {162516},
      author = {Okrent, Abigail M. and Alston, Julian M.},
      title = {The Effects of Farm Commodity and Retail Food Policies on  Obesity and Economic Welfare in the United States},
      address = {2011-10-25},
      number = {1578-2016-134025},
      series = {RMI-CWE},
      pages = {80},
      month = {Oct},
      year = {2011},
      abstract = {Many commentators have claimed that farm subsidies have  contributed significantly to
the ―obesity epidemic‖ by  making fattening foods relatively cheap and abundant  and,
symmetrically, that taxing ―unhealthy‖ commodities or  subsidizing ―healthy‖
commodities would contribute to  reducing obesity rates. In this paper we use an
equilibrium  displacement model to estimate and compare the economic  welfare effects
from a range of hypothetical farm commodity  and retail food policies as alternative
mechanisms for  encouraging consumption of healthy food or discouraging  consumption
of unhealthy food, or both. We find that,  compared with retail taxes on fat, sugar, or all
food, or  subsidies on fruit and vegetables at the farm or retail, a  tax on calories would be
the most efficient as obesity  policy. A tax on calories would have the lowest  deadweight
loss per pound of fat reduction in average adult  weight, and would yield a net social gain
once the impact  on public health care expenditures is considered, whereas  the other
policies typically would involve significant net  social costs.},
      url = {http://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/162516},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.22004/ag.econ.162516},
}