Syrup is not sugar

Well, at least according to outdated laws written well before the invention of high fructose corn syrup in the 1970s. Thus, HFCS is not subject to the sugar tariffs that double the cost of a pound of sugar. As a result, all of our major soft drinks are loaded with artificial sweeteners, such as HFCS, instead of sugar because sugar is artificially expensive. On the flip side of that, corn is artificially cheap because the government subsidizes the cost, allowing growers to sell a lot for very little.