Sun, 19 Nov 2006

Daniels' plan aims beyond uninsured

Well, isn't this interesting? I have but one question for this, and all of the other proposals that depend on "sin taxes" - taxes on alcohol, tobacco, gambling, etc. And that question is "What if they work?"

The way that this is being pitched is simple: smoking is a "sin" - it's bad for you. We want to reduce the number of Hoosiers that smoke. Therefore we should raise the taxes on cigarettes which would reduce the number of smokers through economic means. And look at all the wonderful things we could do with all that extra tax money!

OK, Mitch, but what if raising the taxes by $0.50 per pack cuts the number of smokers drastically? (The last increase in 2002 allegedly cut cigarette consumption by nearly 18%.) In fact, what would happen if all Hoosiers stopped smoking because of it? What happens when tobacco prohibition becomes a reality? Who'll pay for your new health plan then?

Ah, but you see, they've done an economic analysis that calculates the number of Hoosier that would reduce/quit smoking under this new tax regimen. And they know most would not - tobacco is, after all, admittedly highly addictive. And the dirty little secret behind this half-baked scheme is that they're counting on that fact! They don't want Hoosiers to quit smoking - why, look at the lost revenue if we did! In 2004 tobacco taxes accounted for nearly 8% of state revenues.

So, who's bullshitting whom here? A possible rejoinder to the above argument is that since smoking is so harmful to health, reducing smoking will reduce health care costs. Which would be grand, if only it were true. But look at the smoking rates today versus the rates in the 1960's, and then compare health care costs as percentages of GDP for the same time periods. The numbers would seem to indicate that reducing the number of smokers actually raises health care costs! Now, correlation is not causation, but these numbers nonetheless indicate that health care costs rise and fall independently of tobacco use ...

Bottom line: neither the state nor any governmental body really wants smokers to quit. They want to bleed us a bit more, making us feel guilty for funding their new projects as they go. And if we ever do really kick the habit completely, well, the taxpayers in general will be left holding the bag for all these grand illusions.

So call it what it is Mitch: it's a tax increase. And stop living in sin.

Gov. Mitch Daniels' plan to insure about 120,000 low-income Hoosiers through a higher cigarette tax could have implications far beyond expanded access to health care.

(link) [Indianapolis Star]

/Politics | 2 writebacks | permanent link

On 11/20/2006 04:23:03
Bjorngrímnir wrote

On 11/21/2006 08:47:46
Mark Rouse wrote

comment...

 
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