According to an article published in the Los Angeles Times on May 25, 2009, the California legislature will consider a bill in June to raise the tax charged on a pack of cigarettes from $0.87 per pack to $2.37 per pack. If history is any measure, the chance of passage is slim, since California has failed in 14 previous attempts to enact similar measures; and while 45 other states have passed tobacco tax increases in the last decade, California has not. According to the Times, the major tobacco companies consider California to be extremely important as an example for the rest of the country, and that’s probably why they poured $66 million into defeating a 2006 bid to raise the per pack tax by $2.36.
We may want to consider a different path this time, since the tax will earn the state $1.2 billion per year. As we watch teachers get laid off and programs that serve the poorest among us drastically cut or eliminated, this seems like a perfect time to look at any and all sources of income.
The most common reason cited by the anti-tax forces in opposition to the cigarette tax is that it is a regressive tax—it unfairly places a larger burden on lower income groups by taking a bigger percentage bite from them than it does from those more well to do. OK, it’s true—it is a regressive tax. But seriously, there’s more to it than that. Smokers are addicts, and they are going to keep using their drug until it becomes too painful or destructive to do so. A billboard I saw today on a bike ride through Huntington Beach said that the average pack-a-day smoker spends $1,600 each year to support their habit. I find it disingenuous to act like lower income smokers aren’t hurt more financially by each pack they buy than richer smokers are—it seems like smoking itself is regressive. My experience with addiction, both mine and other’s, is that addicts don’t quit until all the negatives of use become unbearable. Is it possible the added cost of a pack taxed at $2.37 will be the straw that breaks this camel’s back? (Ever so sorry for the lame pun).
Beyond that, is it logical to act like the regressive tax is the biggest issue here? There is absolutely no doubt that smokers have more health problems than non-smokers do. Are poorer families better able than the rich to handle the medical costs associated with smoking? Is a poor family more resilient in the face of the loss of one of its members, probably a wage earner, when they die of a smoking related illness? Probably not.
Please take a moment to contact your CA senator to express your support for the increase in tobacco taxes that comes up for consideration by the Senate Health Committee soon. It’s time we joined the ranks of Rhode Island, New York and New Jersey, which tax tobacco at the highest rates in the country, and leave the company of Mississippi, Missouri, and South Carolina, which tax at the embarrassingly low rates of a few cents per pack.
