The Navajo Nation Just Passed a Junk Food Tax. Too Bad Junk Food is All You Can Buy.


More than 80 percent of the food sold on the Navajo Nation qualifies as “junk food”— products high in salt, fat and sugar—and Navajo citizens struggle with disproportionately high rates of heart disease, obesity and diabetes. But on April 1, the Healthy Dine Nation Act, colloquially known as the “junk food tax,” took effect in the Navajo Nation, adding a two percent tax to unhealthy foods like chips, candy and soda while eliminating taxes on healthy items like fresh fruits and vegetables.

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