Unintended consequences of lowering salt in pretzels
I had a little fun with imagining the unintended consequences of a push by the government to lower people’s salt intake. Read the article first and then continue on below.
1. The “voluntary reduction” of sodium in food won’t happen until there is a reduction in demand for high sodium products (I think that is economics). Therefore the government will just have to mandate how much sodium we can take in. It will match up nicely with mandating how much CO2 we can let out.
2. When the government puts regulations on companies for how much sodium they can use (because they won’t be able to stop the individual), companies’ sales will fall. Food companies, mining companies, transportation companies, and every other company in the supply chain will have sales fall. They can then lay off workers because demand decreased. But, the government will have a solution for that. They’ll raise taxes on “the rich” to pay for an additional 12 months of unemployment benefits and get us up to 30+ months of unemployment.
3. The food companies will search for a substitute for sodium. By adding more spices, they’ll increase the cost of production and either decrease their profit margins (lay off more people) or increase the cost of things like soup (decrease demand, lay off more people). Then fewer people will be able to afford things like soup. That’s ok. The government can then force companies to sell soup for less or raise taxes on “the rich” to pay for programs that allow everyone to afford soup which we all have a right to have.
4. Because of the decreased demand in salt and corresponding decrease in revenues, the Salt Lobby will petition congress to provide subsidies for the salt companies so they can keep people employed. That will increase costs to the companies using the salt.
5. A company will come up with a salt substitute that everyone wants to use. Demand will go through the roof and that company will become rich. The Salt Lobby till ask the government to prop up the salt business through taxing the salt substitute company. The salt substitute company will be declared a monopoly and have their business regulated because we can’t have people making obscene profits. Not everyone will be able to get the salt substitute because the financial incentives aren’t aligned. The government will then take over the business and try to supply the salt substitute. They’ll declare a national state of emergency and take over patent rights to the substitute.
6. The salt substitute will then turn out to have incredible long term side effects and give everyone Lou Gehrig’s Disease. The government won’t take responsibility. The original inventors will go to jail. The congressmen and president will pat themselves on the back for getting rid of the evil business man.
7. A small biotechnology company will then determine that they may have the technology to cure Lou Gehrig’s Disease. Since the government runs all health care, there won’t be any incentive for the company to spend millions of dollars on developing the cure.
8. Everyone dies. At least salt won’t have killed us.
