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Saturday, December 29, 2012

The Sugar and Corn Lobbies: So why does Home Depot sell Mexican Coca-Cola?

The Shark Tank wonders why Home Depot sells Mexican Coca-Cola?  
Because the corn lobby wants to keep corn demand high and that includes having high fructose corn syrup king of sweeteners.  And the cane sugar lobby wants to keep protective tariffs and subsidies in place so a few can make a killing growing sugar cane in the Everglades.  

Pat Toomey wrote at Red State about ending the sugar program. It came close, but recent attempts to end this nonsense failed.  Politicians of either party will not vote against their own state's economic interests, even if they know the country will be better off if they did so.  Which shows how hard it is to get rid of such programs once they get entrenched, both parties will fight to protect their state's special interests.  The end result is sugar is much more expensive in the United States than in Mexico.  

It is cost effective for the Mexicans to make their soft drinks with cane sugar.  In the United States most soft drink companies (there are a few small exceptions) use high fructose corn syrup.  That is why Mexican Coke tastes better.

Related nonsense:  Are we going over the Milk Cliff (or Milk Fall)?

5 comments:

  1. It's also sold at Costco.

    NAFTA allows the import. Just like you're going to be seeing Twinkies on the shelves with Mexican sugar (made by Bimbo Foods in Mexico).

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  2. Yes, I buy Mexican Coca Cola for my guests at Costco reasonably regularly. It comes in bottles too, which makes a significant difference flavorwise (the sugar gives a difference in texture vs the HFCS, the sugared Coke is less sticky).

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    1. I agree it is superior. I prefer the glass and I prefer the cane sugar.

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  3. Canadian Coca-Cola is also made with sucrose. I live in northern NY. Everytime the family goes to Niaagara Falls for the day, we walk back across the bridge with extra Cokes and root beers. Soda simply tastes better with real sugar. The soda companies inisit there is no taste difference. I call BS on that. As soon as the soda hits the tongue you can tell which you're drinking.

    It's sugar cane in the everglades and pineapples in Hawaii and sugar beets in Texas that American sugar tariffs support. Allowing free trade in sugar would drop sugar prices drastically.

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  4. The glass bottles help retain the low (cold) temperature of the beverage and cane sugar makes all the difference. Corn sweetener doesn't cut it. Sometimes you can buy Mexican Kellogg's Zucaritas (Mexican Sugar Frosted Flakes) in the border states. The breakfast cereal made with cane sugar tastes considerably better than the same corn flake cereal made with corn sweetener. In Spain, the same cereal is called "Kellogg's Frostis" and it tastes roughly the same as Zucaritas because it too is sweetened with cane sugar.

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