With health care reform knocking on the door, Hong Kong is expecting to pay more in the long term to keep public services at a high standard. Two possible solutions are to increase the tax rate or open up new taxation. One proposed new tax is a "fat tax" on foods, which supporters say would generate revenue and improve people's health at the same time.
Although being fat is a personal status, it has a high cost on any society. The tax-funded public health care system has to bear the financial burden of obesity while obese individuals, for the most part, don't have to pay the medical costs of their own illness.
However, from a practical point of view, critics say it would be almost impossible to determine which food should be taxed and why, and how the government can dictate what people eat.