Shaheena Ahmad in U.S. News & World Report, December 29, 1997/January 5, 1998, as part of an "Outlook 98" series in which the publication, perhaps in a holiday mood, apparently grants lengthy column space to twelve-year-olds who want to solve the world's problems:

The cure for obesity is no mystery either: better diet, more exercise. The trouble is that no one knows how to get more Americans to follow that regimen. Obesity grows for men and women of all ages and all racial groups despite everything our culture has thrown at it: bran muffins, spinning classes, diet books, diet drugs, liposuction, weight-loss clinics, and Oprah Winfrey. Educators and doctors don't seem to have the answer, either....

So what's the solution? Tax Twinkies, says Kelly Brownell, Director of Yale University's Center for Eating and Weight Disorders. Hit junk-food junkies where it hurts: in their wallets. Slapping high-fat, low-nutrition foods with a substantial government "sin tax" is the one step society hasn't tried, and while the obstacles to its enactment are enormous, there's a good reason to think it might work. Study after study of price increases on tobacco and alcohol suggests a correlation between cost and consumption. When the tax is high enough to sharply increase the price, fewer of these products are consumed. Brownell argues that a tax on junk food would have a similar effect.

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