Teamsters' Message To Philly's Moronic Mayor: Soda Tax Will Destroy Jobs

Liberal mayor’s new soda tax may kill up to 2,000 jobs, says union.

A mere five months after taking office, Philadelphia’s new left-wing and ‘economically illiterate‘ Mayor Jim Kenney is wasting no time on tackling the city’s huge obesity problem by slapping a $0.03 per ounce tax on soda drinkers.
This means for a construction worker wanting to drink a bottle of Coke on his lunch, he’ll be shelling out an extra $0.60 and a 44 oz. Big Gulp drinker will likely pay $1.32 more than current prices.
[It is unclear whether ice in a Big Gulp cup will be counted as soda in the new tax.] The Mayor’s office estimates that the tax will raise $432 million for the city, which will then be used to “fund universal pre-K, community schools, enhancements to parks and rec centers around town and other city improvement projects.”
Needless to say, the Teamster are not at all pleased with the tax.
The problem for the Teamsters in and around Philadelphia is, not only is there a large Teamster-represented Coca-Cola plant that produces the targeted sodas, but union drivers deliver it as well.
Teamsters’ Local 830 Secretary-Treasurer Daniel Grace, in a letter to the editor, voiced displeasure about a “secretive” meeting the mayor called with IBEW boss John Dougherty—while leaving the Teamsters uninvited.

With all due respect to my fellow union brother and electricians union leader John Dougherty, who was present at the meeting, it is Teamsters Local 830’s members – not his – who stand to lose their jobs if this ill-considered tax is passed.
The mayor’s proposal would more than double the cost of all sugar-sweetened beverages sold in the city. Sales would plummet. Layoffs across the beverage industry would ensue.
Teamsters Local 830 estimates that as many as 2,000 regional jobs in the beverage industry would be lost. It’s my members’ livelihoods that are at stake.

Previously, the Teamsters’ Grace had noted that “much like the prior administration’s much-ballyhooed tax on cigarettes—which Philadelphia consumers evaded by simply crossing the city borders to buy their tobacco products elsewhere—the same thing will happen with sugary drinks.”