FEES AND TAXES

I saw a letter to the editor in the Minneapolis Red Star Tribune in which the writer was advocating a special tax on soda pop because of its deleterious effects on us -obesity - diabetes, etc., which results in higher costs: higher health care expenses, and thereby, higher insurance premiums.

Since we are already doing that to cigarettes through various taxes (or fees, as Gov. Pawlenty tried his hand at redefinition) because of it's "dangerous effects" to us, by way of second hand smoke, it got me to thinking.

Getting old is also a burden to our communities. As we get older, we incur more medical expenses and face an increasing amount of risk for each additional year we live to some potential highly expensive medical needs, like alzheimers, diabetes, etc.

Therefore, maybe we should have an additional tax or fee that is added onto our taxes every year when we get around to filing the old 1040 form - a tax that gets progressively higher each and every year that we manage to hang on. That way, you see, we could help pay for the increased medical expenses that we cause by refusing to check out early.

Whadda ya think?