Arkansas Blog

At least $0.82 / pack. And while you're at it dedicate some to prevention outstanding of MSA monies that people covet and siphon off a little more away every year.

I love it when people who probably spent more money during the Christmas season than a minimum wage earner makes in a year... decides those minimum wage earners need another regressive tax hike... a tax hike which will not help addicts at all nor help the same folks who also have no health care... and never will with taxes used like this.

Geez Max, It's no secret you despise smoking, but clubbing poor working folks over the head like baby seals is no way to vent ones "strangesque" anger.

So Eureka, why is it you resent increasing taxes, which is in fact one of the most effective means to prevent youth initiation and lower tobacco use overall, and don't resent tobacco companies addicting and killing 4,900 Arkansans every year?

As prices go up.. addicts get more resourceful... Example I see many more smokers rolling their own nowadays because it's cheaper. No filter, Is that better?

I don't mind taxation when used well and applied in a progressive manner. In truth, this thinly veiled excuse for trauma centers... is absolutely a tax on poor and middle income folks, which will only benefit those with much more resources.

We need to raise taxes for medical care.. only when the care will be available to all. To do otherwise only makes the ultimate goal of health care for all that much more difficult, imo. If less well informed folks with no doctor (the most likely smoking demographic)... were to have a doctor talking to them about their health and offering information about health effects of smoking along with aid in quitting smoking... wouldn't that be much better in the short and long run on so many things, not just smoking?

When a sin tax becomes more sinful than the original sin.. we need to admit it... and quit exacerbating the problem.

The cigarette tax, like the lottery, is basically a redistribution of wealth from the poor upward. Greed is probably the top vice of the rich, and probably worse for society as well, but we don't tax that. We reward it and celebrate it.

For example, no (basically) church will ordain a gay person, but they ordain greedy people all the time.

Eureka, I can agree with all you say. But do read the very first post under Iconclast's thread.
That anonymous person laid it out pretty clear and plain.

R's think government should operate on thin air. You know, a miracle like feeding the masses on
two loaves and ten fish. However, as Cheney and his pimp have proven they don't mind massive spending and debts.

.

Will do, eL.. though I had no doubt my argument was a far cry from the GOPers. I still hope, no more taxation in this respect is what prevails.

strange bedfellows

Well spoken, Eureka. If a tobacco tax does not fund prevention and is not significant enough to be prevention then questioning where the money goes might well be in order.

A good part of the coalition pushing for the tax is the crew behind community health centers and a new med school. These cats are definitely the 'haves' rather than the 'have nots' in the state.There is the claim that public health projects benefit everyone. I tend to doubt that claim myself but I do recognize that there is a pool of monies dedicated for health care that covers a wide range of things. And appropriately so for some part.

Getting health care providers to educate their patients that nicotine addiction is a medically treatable disease, and treating them, is a part of effective prevention. But it's not the whole part and not even the most effective part.

"When a sin tax becomes more sinful than the original sin.. we need to admit it... and quit exacerbating the problem."

An insignificant tobacco tax of 50 cents seen merely as a revenue stream is, again, unfortunate. But every little bit that can reduce the amount of profit tobacco companies make is OK w me. Believe it or not It really has not been that long at all that med schools trained doctors to screen for tobacco use.

Change is so slow sometimes we don't even see the paradigm shifting. Remember the last time a push for tobacco taxes was successful they tied a mere 25 cents to a 3% surcharge on everyone's income tax. Hearing Bob Johnson say he'd support even a 50 cent tax is a sign of just how the pendulum swings. Of course he wants to trade the zoo for it.