Does this bother anyone else?

Rob Graham

The proposed use of the tax is to fund expanded coverage under SCHIP (Child health care). Hopefully the vast majority of the beneficiaries don't smoke and never have.

fred_

Am curious to know out of all the responders how many are opposed to smoking and if so do you feel you can be objective in this discussion? and visa-versa

Mike Gaskey

fred_ wrote:

Am curious to know out of all the responders how many are opposed to smoking and if so do you feel you can be objective in this discussion?

I don't, quit 1-1-2000. My wife still smokes. by the way, the new taxes are misleading. If I heard it right, the tax on bulk tobacco far exceeded that of a pack. The tax on a bulk pound went from $1 and change to more than $20. Really hurt the guy on the low end of the economic scale, the one who rolls (legal shit) his own. Heard a guy from back east (Conn. or NY) say he'll now grow his own.

Mike - typical white guy. The USA does have universal healthcare, but you have to pay for it. D'oh. Thomas Mann - "Tolerance becomes a crime when applied to evil." The NYT - my leftist brochure. Calling an illegal alien an “undocumented immigrant” is like calling a drug dealer an “unlicensed pharmacist”. God doesn't believe in atheists, therefore they don't exist.

kmg365

It seems to me budgets don't matter anymore. The scope is bigger than cigarettes. When you deal with the bigger picture of regulation of what toilet you use, what light bulbs you are allowed to buy (incandescents illegal in 2 years), cow fart taxes (cap and trade), yes it is a control issue. I don't think you can deconstruct this to make it a simple revenue issue.

Chris Austin

fred_ wrote:

Isn't that taxation without representation?

You can't vote?

Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --?

Chris Austin

I'm not opposed to smoking and I'll light a cigar on occasion. But, and this one is difficult, now that I am a parent I am not unhappy about how difficult they have made it for smokers in public places.

Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --?

fred_

I do vote. Don't recall this coming up as a referendum, more was forces of the new Democratic Congress pushing their agenda for socialized children's health care, and making the smokers ( an easy target minority ) the recipients of paying the bill. If they financed it any other way the howls would have been much louder.

Rob Graham

Socialists have always seen taxation as a tool for manipulation social structures. At the simplest level, it has long been used for wealth redistribution, based on the Marxist precept "to each according to need, from each according to ability". Here we see it used to shift consumption habits in the desired direction (without due regard for possible unintended consequences). It has not been a simple revenue issue for a very long time, and the most active practitioners of taxation for social manipulation are now running the show. Monetary policy is also seen as a tool to be used to direct social change, and perhaps a more potent one than mere taxation.

Rob Graham

Ex-smoker. Quit 2+ years ago, but my wife still smokes.

Oakman

fred_ wrote:

Don't recall this coming up as a referendum

Lots of issues don't. The theory is that we hire these jablonskis to spent all their time studying the issues for us and making informed decisions for the common good. This actually works as long as the franchise is limited to a relatively elite class who care about the real issues. But once guilt rears its ugly head and voting rights are given to the hoi polloi, they start voting themselves benefits and elect the guy who promises them the most goodies.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

Oakman

fred_ wrote:

yet the revenue they raised isn't going to smokers

It shouldn't. It should to the non-smokers who are forced to breathe the same air.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

Christian Graus

fred_ wrote:

sn't stupid to depend on a revenue stream that's purpose is to decrease?

No, two things are stupid. 1 - smoking 2 - expecting someone other than smokers to accept the burden of smoking to the health system

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. "I am new to programming world. I have been learning c# for about past four weeks. I am quite acquainted with the fundamentals of c#. Now I have to work on a project which converts given flat files to XML using the XML serialization method" - SK64 ( but the forums have stuff like this posted every day )

Rob Graham

Christian Graus wrote:

2 - expecting someone other than smokers to accept the burden of smoking to the health system

The only problem with the present tax increase, is that does absolutely nothing to alleviate the burden to the health system posed by smokers. The proceeds of the tax will go to expand coverage for health care for uninsured Children. If they really gave a damn about the impact smokers have on the health care system they would stop subsidizing Tobacco farmers (to the tune of 530 million since 1997) and prohibit the sale of all tobacco products (as they do for other dangerous drugs).

Chris Austin

fred_ wrote:

Don't recall this coming up as a referendum

The only national referendum we have ever had in this country is when we choose our congress and to a lesser extinct our governors and state house and senate.

fred_ wrote:

If they financed it any other way the howls would have been much louder.

What? You don't think that if we continue down the road to a single payer system for health care that we aren't all going to be feeling it in the pocketbooks? This is just the opening shot because smokers are an easy target. Have you tried growing your own tobacco? I brew my own beer I save a lot of money that way and it is a fun hobby. I am sure that in the near future I'll see the price of hops and barley go up due to sin taxes as well. But, I wont start calling it taxation without representation. I'll just blame the people who voted for the doorknobs in congress and probably buy a few acres and start growing my own.

Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --?

Chris Austin

Rob Graham wrote:

If they really gave a damn about the impact smokers have on the health care system they would stop subsidizing Tobacco farmers (to the tune of 530 million since 1997) and prohibit the sale of all tobacco products (as they do for other dangerous drugs)

Thats a lot of money. I imagine it is just a drop in the bucket compared to the subsidizes the corn farmers get. My nephew's father lives off the money he is paid for not farming his high dollar land in Iowa. Shameful.

Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --?

modified on Friday, April 3, 2009 5:37 PM

Chris Austin

Mike Gaskey wrote:

Heard a guy from back east (Conn. or NY) say he'll now grow his own.

I like that. We need to get out of our consumer mindset in this country anyway. I would hope that growing your own tobacco (or veggies, or whatever) can be a first step for some people.

Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --?

Christian Graus

Well, it's an interesting question, why tobacco was historically not banned and dope was. Subsidies are just an example of the corruption inherit in the US system of government. Here, the money goes in to health directly, AFAIK.

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. "I am new to programming world. I have been learning c# for about past four weeks. I am quite acquainted with the fundamentals of c#. Now I have to work on a project which converts given flat files to XML using the XML serialization method" - SK64 ( but the forums have stuff like this posted every day )

John Carson

Rob Graham wrote:

If there were any real concern for the welfare of smokers, they would abolish the industry by making the growth of tobacco, the manufacture of tobacco products, and the importation of tobacco products all illegal.

Sure. After all, prohibition worked a treat.

John Carson

Yusuf

fred_ wrote:

the revenue they raised isn't going to smokers. It goes to health benefits

in some states it does not go into health benefits at all. How about that? :omg:

Yusuf Oh didn't you notice, analogous to square roots, they recently introduced rectangular, circular, and diamond roots to determine the size of the corresponding shapes when given the area. Luc Pattyn[^]

John Carson

Rob Graham wrote:

The only problem with the present tax increase, is that does absolutely nothing to alleviate the burden to the health system posed by smokers.

A buck is a buck. This tying of revenue to specific expenditure is largely pointless. Unless the tied expenditure amounts to more that the total that would be spent on something in the absence of tying (and thus compels an increase in total funding), there is no guarantee that the tying will increase expenditure at all: other sources of funding can be reduced as an offset. Equally, spending money from a cigarette tax on something not smoking-related could free up money from funding that other thing, making more money available for caring for sick smokers. Or it may be that, say, the cost of lung cancer treatment has caused other areas to be starved of funds in the past, and so spending cigarette taxes on them now is just making up for the past displacement of funds to smokers. Tying or not tying is largely window dressing.

John Carson