Taxes on sweetened beverages are a hot new trend among cities, sweeping progressive spots like Philadelphia, San Francisco, Oakland, the Chicago area, Boulder, and now Seattle. Like other cities, Seattle will charge the tax at the distributor level, but it will not include “diet” drinks with non-nutritive sweeteners. [More]
not so sweet
Kraft To Cadbury Workers: Leave Pension Plan Or Take Pay Freeze
By 4.4.10
Mac-n-cheese king Kraft Foods, which acquired British chocolate maker Cadbury earlier this year, isn’t wasting any time when it comes to flexing some American-style corporate muscle. According to the Financial Times, Kraft has warned 3,600 Cadbury employees that they’ll face a three-year pay freeze if they don’t agree to “voluntarily” opt out of the company’s pension plan.
Separately, Kraft announced that CEO Irene Rosenfeld was getting a 40% pay hike this year, due in part to her “exceptional” management of the Cadbury deal. Rosenfeld’s 2009 take will be about $26 million.
