Do You Support Cigarette Taxes?

The cigarette taxes are prohibitively high, and they serve as a far more effective deterrent than all the anti-smoking campaigns and efforts to educate the public about the dangers of nicotine. People can fast forward through those commercials and disregard all the warning labels, but it's hard to ignore the contents of your wallet. In the early 2000s France put an exorbitant tax on cigarettes, and as a result the number of new smokers there in the past decade has decreased dramatically. Most countries within the EU now have the tax, and it's becoming more common around the rest of the world too. Part of my family is French, and my cousins who are slightly older than I am said that teens today don't pick up smoking as they did in past generations because of the cost.

You have to consider all the motives behind the taxes. The obvious one is to dissuade people from smoking. There's overwhelming evidence about the health problems it can cause, and the fact that it can significantly lower a person's life expectancy. So, if the tax is detrimental enough to a person's finances her or she opts to not start smoking or to give it up, then it is ultimately beneficial to him or her. It's beneficial to the community to have less smokers exposing others to second-hand smoke. It's beneficial to the work force to have less smokers, many of whom will take breaks throughout the day to smoke. People might not think that 10 minutes here and there equate to that much in lost revenue, but in truth, it adds up to fortune. Companies have also lost billions due to disabilities and premature death related to smoking. It's beneficial to the environment to have less smokers.

The real reason for the tax is to raise much-needed revenue. The national tax Obama signed into law this year supports children's health care, mental health and other programs. New York's cigarette taxes are expected to bring in over $400 million for the state. It will support AIDs research and other worthy programs. The recession has brutalized the economy, and the ramifications of it has trickled down to schools, households and many needed programs. Everything is buckling in from the weight of it all, and cigarette taxes help to alleviate some of it without much harm being caused. Smoking is optional. If a person decides to smoke despite all the consequences to himself and everyone else, the taxes help to compensate for them. If you're dragging the economy down by your smoking habit, why shouldn't you have to help bring it back up a little?
In California there is a measure going on the 2012 ballots to increase the taxes on cigarettes here so the funding will go into cancer research.

I do think the cigarette taxes are a little too steep, though. I was talking to a man in his 70s who was being treated for lung cancer a few months ago, and he said his doctors had actually advised him to keep smoking because after decades of doing it quitting would cause too much stress to his body when it was already weakened. Our generation is fully aware of the risks associated with smoking, but his wasn't. So, simply for people like him I think the taxes should be lowered just a notch.

I am also in favor of legalizing marijuana for the financial benefits it will offer. I read an article in the LA Times earlier this year about how the taxes from it could go towards education and help to prevent layoffs and budget cuts.
If it was legalized it could also be better regulated.

I'm not as in support of taxes on junk food and soda, but I'm not entirely opposed to them either. There has been a lot of discussion in the UK about adding a 10% tax to foods that are high in saturated fat and lacking in nutritional value.
The grand total of taxes on cigarettes in the US and EU amounts to over 50% of its price, and of course I don't think taxes on food should ever be that high. Though obesity does greatly affect the overall economical health of the nation, secondary effects on people eating poorly are not as great as with smoking. There isn't a risk of someone sitting next to an obese person munching on nachos getting "secondhand fat." Also, food is mandatory to life whereas smoking is not.
If junk foods were to be taxed it should be for specific snack items like soda and chips. I wouldn't be in favor of taxing fast food or other foods that would be used for an actual meal since many from lower-income homes eat them more out of necessity than personal preference.

I know it seems like the taxes on cigarettes and junk food inhibit personal liberties but I don't really think they do. You can still smoke if you wish and eat whatever you'd like, and the extra taxes you spend help to better the economy.

~ peace : )

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/22/nyregion/22budget.html

Suggestion:

Reasonable taxes but the moral majority whined until they got everything they wanted including extortion. Bunch of Humvee driving cry babies. I want to see higher gas taxes so the morons will quit wasting it. And tax churches too, the free ride is over.