Philadelphia

Just a month after PepsiCo said it would lay off 80-100 people due to the 'unintended consequences' of Philadelphia's new soda-tax, Philly Coke, the local Coca-Cola bottler, has cut 40 jobs amid a 32% plunge in sales.

Since all of this is taking place as previewed in a recent post: "The 'Soda Police' Just Learned A Valuable Lesson About Taxes", we doubt it would come as a surprise to anyone, although we are confident that Philadelphia city workers will be amazed by these unexpected developments.

Two weeks ago we reported that the latest unintended casualty from Philadelphia's soda tax would be at least 20% of Pepsi's 423 employees in the city of brotherly love. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, with sales slumping as much as 40% because of the new Philadelphia sweetened beverage tax, in the last week of February, Pepsi said it will lay off 80 to 100 workers at three distribution plants that serve the city.

Following the Trump administration's recent federal illegal immigration crackdowns, organizers have canceled El Carnaval de Puebla, a major Cinco De Mayo celebration in Philadelphia.

This week, ICE announced that 248 people in Pennsylvania, Delaware and West Virginia are now in federal custody awaiting deportation after a two-week sweep.

Two weeks ago, we pointed out that when Philadelphia became the first US city to pass a soda tax last summer, city officials were eagerly looking forward to the surplus-tax funded windfall to plug gaping budget deficits (and, since this is Philadelphia, the occasional embezzlement scheme). Then, one month ago, after the tax went into effect on January 1st we showed the tax applied in practice: a receipt for a 10 pack of flavored water carried a 51% beverage tax. And since  PA has a sales tax of 6% and Philly already charges another 2%, the total sales tax was 8%.

When Philadelphia became the first US city to pass a soda tax last summer, city officials were eagerly looking forward to the surplus-tax funded windfall to plug gaping budget deficits (and, since this is Philadelphia, the occasional embezzlement scheme). Then, one month ago, after the tax went into effect on January 1st we showed the tax applied in practice: a receipt for a 10 pack of flavored water carried a 51% beverage tax. And since  PA has a sales tax of 6% and Philly already charges another 2%, the total sales tax was 8%.