Many countries require cigarette smokers to pay particularly high taxes on their purchases of cigarettes; similar taxes are being considered for unhealthy foods. The policy of imposing high taxes on cigarettes and other unhealthy products has a number of social benefits.
First of all, the taxes discourage people from indulging in unhealthy behaviors. Raising taxes on cigarettes, for instance, leads people to buy fewer of them. Smoking has declined as taxes on tobacco have risen, showing that these taxes do work to make society healthier. It can be expected that imposing similar taxes on unhealthy food and beverages would help reduce obesity rates.
Second, taxes of this kind are financially fair. When people get sick as a result of their smoking or eating unhealthy foods, they create medical costs. It is unfair that everyone in the society, including nonsmokers and people who follow a healthy diet, should contribute equally to covering these costs. Taxing people who engage in unhealthy behaviors creates extra income that can be used to cover the medical costs. In this way, some of the financial burden is shifted from all of society to just those who choose to participate in the unhealthy activities.
Finally, the high rate of taxation on cigarettes significantly increases revenue for the government. In addition to using this tax revenue on medical assistance, governments often use the revenue for other projects that benefit public welfare, such as building stadiums or creating public parks. Even basic government-supported services like public education benefit from these taxes. Thus, the taxes on cigarettes, and the proposed taxes on unhealthy foods, benefit everyone.
In the lecture, all three points made in the reading passage were challenged. First, the lecture addressed the claim that taxes for unhealthy food would discourage people from unhealthy behaviors. The speaker argued that it is totally possible that people with unhealthy diets may respond to such taxation by keep buying unhealthy foods but start to eliminate healthy foods, which creates an even more negative effect on their health.
Second, the speaker further questions that whether the taxes on unhealthy foods can really considered to be fair. Although from one point of view, it may seem reasonable that people with unhealthy diets should pay more taxes in order to cover up the medical expenses that would be spent on them due to their unhealthy behavior, this kind of tax actually fails to take into account people's incomes. If we look at it this way, by eating the same amount of unhealthy food, rich and poor people needs to pay the same tax, which makes it more of a burden for people with lower income, what was originally considered fair became unfair in this perspective.
Finally, the speaker argues that the increase in revenue for the government due to taxing the consumption of unhealthy food is not really a good idea. This result would possibly lead into government's dependence of such taxes. If a large amount of the government income comes from taxing people eating unhealthy food, the government might be reluctant to implement policies that would eliminate these unhealthy behavior because the government relies on unhealthy behavior to gain revenue.
With the above points made, the lecture attacks the three main points made in the reading passage and gives a strong opposing stance against the proposal that government should impose taxes on unhealthy products.
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, but, finally, first, if, look, may, really, second, so, kind of
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 7.0 10.4613686534 67% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 10.0 5.04856512141 198% => OK
Conjunction : 3.0 7.30242825607 41% => More conjunction wanted.
Relative clauses : 11.0 12.0772626932 91% => OK
Pronoun: 22.0 22.412803532 98% => OK
Preposition: 43.0 30.3222958057 142% => OK
Nominalization: 9.0 5.01324503311 180% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1505.0 1373.03311258 110% => OK
No of words: 294.0 270.72406181 109% => OK
Chars per words: 5.11904761905 5.08290768461 101% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.14082457966 4.04702891845 102% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.44615530644 2.5805825403 95% => OK
Unique words: 161.0 145.348785872 111% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.547619047619 0.540411800872 101% => OK
syllable_count: 452.7 419.366225166 108% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.55342163355 97% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 3.25607064018 92% => OK
Article: 6.0 8.23620309051 73% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 1.25165562914 240% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 0.0 1.51434878587 0% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 2.5761589404 116% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 10.0 13.0662251656 77% => Need more sentences. Double check the format of sentences, make sure there is a space between two sentences, or have enough periods. And also check the lengths of sentences, maybe they are too long.
Sentence length: 29.0 21.2450331126 137% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 75.9289799747 49.2860985944 154% => OK
Chars per sentence: 150.5 110.228320801 137% => OK
Words per sentence: 29.4 21.698381199 135% => OK
Discourse Markers: 7.3 7.06452816374 103% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 4.09492273731 98% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 4.19205298013 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 0.0 4.33554083885 0% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 9.0 4.45695364238 202% => Less negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 1.0 4.27373068433 23% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.26167755367 0.272083759551 96% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.118236666853 0.0996497079465 119% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0679848007661 0.0662205650399 103% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.165879610927 0.162205337803 102% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0450079126332 0.0443174109184 102% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 17.4 13.3589403974 130% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 50.5 53.8541721854 94% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 5.55761589404 56% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.4 11.0289183223 121% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.01 12.2367328918 106% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.35 8.42419426049 99% => OK
difficult_words: 61.0 63.6247240618 96% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 10.5 10.7273730684 98% => OK
gunning_fog: 13.6 10.498013245 130% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.2008830022 125% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 85.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 25.5 Out of 30
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.