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NY cigarette tax puffs up prices
Cigarette packs are on display for sale in a shop in New York City.
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Kai Ryssdal: The state of New York is trying to close a multi-billion dollar hole in its budget. So as part of the emergency spending bill that the legislature passed yesterday, the cigarette tax in the Empire State is going to go up to $4.36 a pack. That means New Yorkers will be paying upwards of $9 a pack -- almost $11 when you add in city taxes. Seems like an easy answer for lawmakers, in terms of raising revenue while pushing smokers to quit. And so you'd think all the other states would be racing to follow New York's lead.
Marketplace's Jeremy Hobson explains not so.
Jeremy Hobson: On the streets of midtown Manhattan today, we wanted to see if $11 a pack will cause smokers to cut back.
Here's 36-year-old Laura Doure.
Laura Doure: Ultimately, I'd like to say that it would make me smoke less, but it just doesn't. It just makes me go more broke.
And here's 46-year-old Gregory Bear.
Gregory BearI will have to cut down, just because my wife will kill me if I don't. That's what it comes down to.
There's no question about the effectiveness of cigarette taxes for Peter Fisher. He's the vice president for state issues at the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids.
Peter Fisher: For every 10 percent increase in the price of a pack of cigarettes, you would normally expect to see about a 7 percent decline in youth smoking and a 2 percent decline in adult smoking.
And Fisher says cigarette taxes do a fine job filling budget gaps, too. He says states have raised tobacco taxes more than 100 times in the past 10 years.
Fisher: You know some states like New York, like New Mexico, have increased their taxes multiple times in that period so the vast majority of states have taken this action.
As for the ones that haven't gone as far as New York, Fisher says smokers are voters too -- and 20 percent of Americans smoke.
Bert Waisanen studies state budgets at the National Conference of State Legislatures. He says for many states, a tobacco tax hike can't solve a budget crisis.
Bert Waisanen: Tobacco taxes might be, you know, 4 percent or 5 percent of state revenue, so they're not a major source of revenue.
Of course, some states rely on the tobacco industry for jobs. North Carolina claims 255,000 of its jobs are tobacco related. It has one of the lowest tobacco taxes in the nation at 45 cents a pack.
In New York, I'm Jeremy Hobson for Marketplace.
I say we just kill all the fucks who are driving us smokers broke. Now I have to drive to the res to stockpile before the state starts taxing them too...time to go to reservations in other states i suppose and stockpile. Fuck this damn hypocritical police state.
How much tax on a single item is legal? What happened to Freedom of Choice? I choose to smoke, I am an adult. Why am I discriminated against? To this day there is no clinical proof that 2nd hand smoke does any damage at all. Hell, my partents smoked 2 packs a day around the kids, as did my aunts and uncles. Nothing ever happened to anyone else. This is all a bunch of crap. I pay my taxes b ut because I CHOOSE to smoke I get taxed more. All because some politicians can't balance the money. Thye charge all these tolls here in NY. Where does ALL that money go? It sure as hell doesn't fix the roads.
Of course the Antismokers pushing the tax increase to guarantee their own salaries love to say things like, "For every 10% increase in the price... expect to see about a 7% decline in youth smoking and a 2% decline in adult smoking."
Think about that in the context of NY City in 2002/03: NYC got hit with over $3/pack in tax increases on MUCH lower base prices in the space of a year or so. If the Antismokers were telling the truth there'd barely be two skinny kids in a basement in Harlem smoking a cigarette between them nowadays - especially when you take into account all the other "important" things the Antismokers have spent hundreds of millions of dollars of tax money on.
They lie about taxes the same way they lie about the "deadly threat" of the merest wisps of seondary smoke. You can read more about those lies in the free "Stiletto" booklet at:
http://encyclopedia.smokersclub.com/257.html
If you have any specific disagreements share them here. I am open about who I am, what my "conflicting interest" might be, and I stand firmly behind what I write.
Michael J. McFadden,
Author of "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains"
If this is about using taxes to discourage unhealthy behaviors, then why aren't they considering a tax on non-essential food items (Junk food, snacks, ice cream and candy)? There are a lot more overweight people than there are smokers and the number of smokers keeps decreasing while the average waistline increases. So perhaps this would be a more financially sustainable solution to states' budget woes than hitting up an impoverished and vanishing minority.
While I'm not a smoker and generally despise tobacco in general, this is a bad policy, for two reasons: First, it's a regressive tax that hits the poor the hardest. Second, it increases the demand for cheaper smuggled cigarettes, which are a major revenue source for both criminal gangs and terrorist organizations, and provide *no* tax revenue to the state anyway.
You lost a chance at greater insight. You provided the full names of the interviewees. What many would not say is that they would get their cigarettes from other states to avoid showing up on NYS' ATF radar. Nearby states, such as New Hampshire, will gain the revenue or, if the smoker goes to Missouri or California, they'll just stuff a few days/weeks supply in their baggage.
