Gov. Mark Parkinson said he would consider a new tax on tobacco products for increased revenue.
Friday, September 25, 2009
Sam Anderson, Lawrence junior, said when he started smoking his freshman year, Pall Malls were $2.05 a pack. He buys that same pack today for about $4.80.
Click here to see an interactive map of tobacco taxes in the United States.
Governor Mark Parkinson said he would consider a new tax on tobacco products for increased revenue. Holly Cento, Mission Viejo, Calif., junior, spends $20 a week on Camel Lights adding up to more than $1.
However, if the state deficit doesn’t get any lower, that cost could go up yet again.
Facing a shortfall as high as $1 billion for this fiscal year, Governor Mark Parkinson has said he would consider turning to a cigarette tax for revenue.
Proponents of the cigarette tax tout added revenue, decreased health care costs and fewer smokers among the benefits of increasing the excise tax.
The addicted, however, don’t see it in quite the same light.
“I think it’s bullshit,” Holly Cento, Mission Viejo, Calif., junior, said.
She said she’d been smoking for three years and now burned through more than $20 a week for her Camel Lights — that’s more than $1,000 in a year.
FDA Bans Flavored Cigarettes
Effective Sept. 22, the Food and Drug Administration enacted a ban on all flavored cigarettes, including clove, candy and fruit flavors. The ban is intended to stop young people from starting smoking.
According to the FDA 17 year-old smokers are three times as likely to smoke these varieties than 25 year-old smokers.
Alex Noor, the owner of the Tobacco Mart on 23rd Street, received a letter about the ban about two months ago. Even though he stopped ordering the flavored cigarettes, he still has some in his inventory. He said he was not clear on what to do with them.
“I guess we’re supposed to throw them away or destroy them,” Noor said. “I don’t really know.”
He said he was not too concerned about the ban because flavored cigarettes only make up about 1 percent of his total sales.
— Zach White
“They’re making enough money off us already,” she said. “It’s not fair for them to keep doing that.”
Generated Revenue
Should the Kansas Legislature approve another tax hike, it would be the second increase in tobacco taxes within one year, following the 62-cent federal tax increase this past April. However, a state increase on the tax would be Kansas’ first in eight years.
The state’s last hike in the cigarette tax was in 2002, which raised the tax from 24 cents per pack to 79 cents. According to state budget reports, the tax jump increased state revenue to more than $129 million in the first year — an additional $81 million.
Since that time, the amount of money collected from state cigarette taxes has declined. In fact, approved revenue from the state cigarette tax for this fiscal year, which began July 1, is $102 million, a decline of about 26 percent from seven years ago.
That’s still double what the state made before the tax increase, said Mary Jayne Hellebust, executive director of the Tobacco Free Kansas Coalition. But as economic times get tougher and federal tobacco taxes get higher, smokers are learning to either curb their addiction or find other means to alleviate their nicotine cravings.
Anderson said he started rolling his own cigarettes freshman year, both for the novelty and for the decreased cost. Now he only rolls when he doesn’t have enough money for the Pall Malls, which he said was about every two weeks.
Three years ago, he said he could make about 30 cigarettes for $1.10. That cost has increased to about $4.25, he said, but it’s still 10 cents cheaper per cigarette than the ones that come in a box.
Part of that is because loose tobacco qualifies as one of many “other tobacco products,” which also includes chewing tobacco. In Kansas, OTPs are taxed, and have been since 1972, at 10 percent of the manufacturer’s cost.
OTPs are expected to generate $5.8 million for this fiscal year.
Cessation
The deterrent effect the tax has on smokers is one of the top benefits of the tax cited by its proponents.
Several studies have found that a 10 percent increase in tobacco tax reduces overall cigarette consumption by 3 to 5 percent. That number jumps to as high as 7 percent for minors.
When Kansas passed its tax increase in 2002, the number of smoking adults ages 18 to 24 declined about 5 percentage points during the next year, according to a survey conducted by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. As of 2007, that number had declined another 10 percentage points.
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study found more conservative results, noting a 12-percentage-point drop for that age group in Kansas from 2001 to 2007.
“Price is a strong deterrent to smoking,” Hellebust said. “Particularly with young folks who have other things they might want to purchase.”
This has held true for Dean Fessenden, Junction City senior, who decided to kick the habit last Sunday after six years of on and off smoking.
“I’m broke,” he said. “It’s too expensive a habit for me to keep up.”
He said he started budgeting the cost of his cigarettes — $5.36 for his Camels — with necessities such as rent and electricity, before finally realized he didn’t have enough income to pay for it all.
But for smokers like Anderson and Cento, quitting hasn’t yet become an option.
“There’s really nothing we as smokers can do about it,” Anderson said. “They’ve got us in their evil clutches because of their addictive chemicals.”
Ken Sarber, health educator with Student Health Services, said he had helped dozens of students quit smoking, but the main motivator couldn’t be the price per pack.
“There have to be more reasons than just cost for people to successfully quit smoking,” he said.
The next legislative session for Kansas meets in January, at which point leaders of the state will decide the fate of the tobacco tax. Until then, Kansas will most likely retain its place as the 35th highest state tax on cigarettes in the United States.
— — Edited by Megan Morriss
Mallot and Haworth Halls, two of the larger ...
1 comment
Lawrence Settles Lawrence graduate student “I like T-Pain ...
1 comment
Mallot and Haworth Halls, already two of the ...
1 comment
It was the symmetry of this sidewalk that ...
1 comment
Texting while driving is the cause of many ...
1 comment
Comments
Hurleyvision (anonymous) says...
Cigarette smoke contains formaldehyde, nicotine, carbon monoxide and cyanide. The latter two are used in the gas chamber. So, why would anyone who is playing with a full deck suck those toxics into their lungs? No one should ever smoke around an infant, child or person who could be harmed by the toxic sidestream smoke.
September 25, 2009 at 12:37 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
harleyrider1978 (anonymous) says...
Poor hurley...why dont you tell the truth about second hand smoke..........but of course your paid to spread lies and propaganda.........The fact is second hand smoke is a joke.......a joke you ask? ITS 98% WATER VAPOR STEAM....If your afraid of water like hurley is,then you will be afraid of second hand smoke...Why take my word for it.......lets see what osha says about it.....As for secondhand smoke in the air, OSHA has stated outright that:
"Field studies of environmental tobacco smoke indicate that under normal conditions, the components in tobacco smoke are diluted below existing Permissible Exposure Levels (PELS.) as referenced in the Air Contaminant Standard (29 CFR 1910.1000)...It would be very rare to find a workplace with so much smoking that any individual PEL would be exceeded."
-Letter From Greg Watchman, Acting Sec'y, OSHA, To Leroy J Pletten, PHD, July 8, 1997
and then.........
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
British Medical Journal & WHO conclude secondhand smoke "health hazard" claims are greatly exaggerated
The BMJ published report can be found here:
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/3...
And concludes:
The results do not support a causal relation between environmental tobacco smoke and tobacco related mortality. The association between exposure to environmental tobacco smoke and coronary heart disease and lung cancer may be considerably weaker than generally believed.
September 25, 2009 at 6:36 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
harleyrider1978 (anonymous) says...
What makes this study more significant than any other is that it took place over a 39 year period, and studied the results of non-smokers who lived with smokers..... meaning these non-smokers were exposed to secondhand smoke up to 24 hours per day; 365 days per year for 39 years. And there was still no relation between environmental tobacco smoke and tobacco related mortality.
This report was of course silenced in the media; however in light of the damage to business, jobs, and the economy from smoking bans the BMJ report should be revisited by lawmakers as a reference tool and justification to repeal the now unnecessary and very damaging smoking ban laws.
Also significant is the World Health Organization (WHO) study which concluded "..secondhand smoking doesn't cause cancer..." found online here.
Excerpt:
Passive smoking doesn't cause cancer-official
By Victoria Macdonald, Health Correspondent
The results are consistent with their being no additional risk for a person living or working with a smoker and could be consistent with passive smoke having a protective effect against lung cancer. The summary, seen by The Telegraph, also states: "There was no association between lung cancer risk and ETS exposure during childhood."
And if lawmakers need additional real world data to further highlight the need to eliminate these onerous and arbitrary laws, air quality testing by Johns Hopkins University, the American Cancer Society, a Minnesota Environmental Health Department, and various researchers whose testing and report was also peer reviewed and published in the esteemed British Medical Journal......prove that secondhand smoke is 2.6 - 25,000 times SAFER than occupational (OSHA) workplace regulations.
September 25, 2009 at 6:36 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
LawrenceGrown (anonymous) says...
Water vapor steam? Seriously? Are you a humidifier?
September 25, 2009 at 9:22 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
harleyrider1978 (anonymous) says...
Bingo,congradulations you done figured out the anti-smoking lobbys strategy........your humidifier as a kid...think of it as a second hand smoke generator...did you live thru it.
September 25, 2009 at 9:50 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
virgilk (anonymous) says...
States are going to be very disappointed. Of the last 40 states to pass a new cigarette tax only 8 saw a rise in revenue and the others saw as much as a 68% drop. With this new Federal tax there is going to be an even a larger drop in revenue. When will these idiots understand they are taxing poor people into quitting with no hope of generating more income. You cannot hope to increase revenue and drive the very thing you are taxing out of business. This is going to cost the Federal and State Governments the Billions they are hoping to get plus Billions less than they are receiving now. Greed and stupidity are not a good mix. One Senator, on the floor of the Senate, said we will need 22 million new smokers to keep the SCHIP program funded. Without new smokers it will fail within 2 to 4 years. Has anyone noticed that smoking has gone from 54% to less than 24%? Looks like the smokers will be joined by all the Non-Smokers in paying for this SCHIP program the Anti-Smokers are so proud of. Then you will hear some real bitching. Being open to others being over taxed comes back to bite you and it will. It’s called Socialism and other ism’s we won’t like.
September 25, 2009 at 10:43 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
virgilk (anonymous) says...
Hurleyvision should go to this site. You may see how wrong you are.
"THE DOSE MAKES THE POISON"
http://www.nycclash.com/smoke_chart.html
This chart looks at substances found in Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS) for which measurements have actually been obtained – very few, of course,because it is difficult to even find these chemicals in diffuse and diluted ETS.
It calculates the volume of a 100m3 sealed and unventilated enclosure (about 20 by 20 feet with a 9- foot ceiling). Taking Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) figures for ETS yields per cigarette, it determines the number of cigarettes required to reach the lowest, most stringent published threshold for these substances.
For Benzo[a]pyrene, 222,000 cigarettes would be needed to reach the lowest published "danger" threshold.
For Acetone, 118,000.
For Hydrazine, slightly more than 14,000.
Toluene would require 50,000 packs of smoldering cigarettes. At 20 cigarettes per pack, that's one million cigarettes.
Of course, the moment one introduces real world factors to the room –
a door, an open window or two, or a healthy level of mechanical air exchange – achieving these levels becomes even more implausible.
Frankly, it is difficult to imagine a situation where these threshold
limits could be realized.
September 25, 2009 at 10:50 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
georgekaplan (anonymous) says...
I think taxes like this are a joke because all they do is allow politicians to play shell games so that nobody notices what's happening. They count on this revenue while at the same time act as though they want it to reduce use? But reduced consumption would cause revenue shortfalls? Meanwhile that "money" was already spent...Why not legalize certain class a narcotics and tax them heavily? Pay to play? Tax to discourage behavior? Is that a good approach? Alcohol tax? Let's see the stats on booze from some of the cut-and-paste crowd. BTW I don't smoke, I just wonder...
September 25, 2009 at 2:15 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
radioone (anonymous) says...
Folks.... it is very simple.... here is my solution...
www.greensmoke.com/radio
Costs A LOT LESS, doesn't have all the chemicals that cigarettes do.... and the tax is on TOBACCO, not NICOTINE.... I have no desire to quit nicotine..... But I have no desire to get taxed to death on cigarettes..... check it out and make up your own mind.... It's changed my habit completely!
www.greensmoke.com/radio
September 25, 2009 at 6:39 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
kylebuschraces (anonymous) says...
REAL EASY WAY TO GET SMOKERS TO STOP......TAX THEM $20.00 A PACK...............NASTY HABIT SMOKING.SOME OF THE LEAST PRODUCTIVE PEOPLE I WORK WITH..ALWAYS RUNNING OUTSIDE TO SMOKE EVERY 20 MINUTES.WHAT A WAIST OF THERE HEALTH AND US WHO DON`T SMOKE THAT JUNK !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
September 25, 2009 at 9:28 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
justonemore (anonymous) says...
Georgekaplan,
What I would like to point out is that these politicians are not only looking for higher revenue, but also realize how much cigarette smoke costs our country. Tobacco smokers cost our country close to $600 per year PER TAXPAYING FAMILY for their medical bills resulting from their smoking. Therefore, if higher taxes are levied and (as virgilk says) most states see a decline in income, one can deduce that less people are smoking. I would much rather save money on healthcare than find more revenue to cover it. Go ahead and smoke if you want, but I don't want to be paying for your ER visit when you have a stroke, or having funds from my health insurance company help to cover your anti-cancer medications.
September 27, 2009 at 5:31 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Nelson (anonymous) says...
Those that say second hand smoke is harmless need to do more research. it has been proven that there are over 4,000 chemicals in one cigarette 60 known chemicals that cause cancer. Not believe that they could cause cancer, but DO CAUSE CANCER. The tobacco companies use families in third world countries to make cigarettes cheap and so that they can get away with putting illegal pesticides on the tobacco leaves. Tobacco products are made to do two things causes addiction and slowly kills those that that use the product. If you have ever seen anyone with cancer or on a respirator that is addicted to tobacco you know how addicted people become. The whole idea of water vapor is not true at all and that person has no idea what they are talking about. You have been reading way too much about the false Hookah stories which by the way still contains many cancer causing products. When it comes down to it it is simple. Smoking causes and addiction that will kill those that use and those that are around it. Here is a great article on the benefits that communities are seeing by going smoke free. Article by CNNhealth.com
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/09/22/...
September 28, 2009 at 11:35 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Nelson (anonymous) says...
I would also like those that looked at Harleyrider1978 article should probably read how that article was turned down by a true medical journal. See attachment letter bellow.
http://www.pmdocs.com/PDF/2065122062_...
September 28, 2009 at 12:06 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
justonemore (anonymous) says...
Thanks for your references Nelson. I completely agree with you on most points. I must disagree about one point though. Tobacco products are not MADE TO kill those that use the product, but they do as a side effect. If they could make a tobacco product that caused addiction without causing cancer/ephysema/hypertension/death they would have a much more profitable product.
And to the guy with the water vapor comment: many combustion reactions result in a great deal of water vapor including internal combustion engines used in cars, but I don't see many people sucking on their muffler tips, haha. Just because a hydrocarbon is being burned doesn't mean that nothing harmful will result. Subtract the thousands of chemicals, and at the very least you still have carbon monoxide.
September 28, 2009 at 5:52 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Hurleyvision (anonymous) says...
AA folks go to meeting and brag about how many days they have gone without a hit. Within minutes, most of them are outside polluting their bodies and the air with cigarette smoke. Cigarettes have been engineered to create craving about every twenty minutes. It keeps the tobacco companies in business.
Cigarette smoke stinks up your breath, hair, clothes, car, home, furniture and anyone else unlucky enough to be near you. But, smokers don't collect as much social security as non smokers do. And, smoking works as birth control. Researchers found that smokers say, "Lets just cuddle tonight" many years before non-smokers do.
Laugh for today: Obamacare suggests that some people are going to spend their money on health care rather than alcohol, tobacco or dope. Those who don't buy health insurance can be fined or sent to jail. Dopers never pay fines and the jails and prisons are full.
Cigarettes are so addicting that smokers spend their money on cigarettes before they buy food for their kids. When friends and relatives get a call from a smoker asking for money to pay for their utilities, or whatever, they are essentially asking for cigarette money.
Now that the medical hazards of smoking are known, most kids smoke to look big and some smoke to show how rebellious and obnoxious they can be.
October 2, 2009 at 12:17 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
georgekaplan (anonymous) says...
tell St. Peter at the pearly gate that you hate to make him wait, but...
p.s. the person who told me to smoke if I want must have missed my parting sentence fragment where I stated that I did, in point of fact, not smoke. But I ask, what about all the fattys? We all gotta pay for their heart attacks, strokes, joint problems, breathing issues, etc... What about super high tax on McD's? Or on cheap domestic beer?--the real reason for the "freshman fifty"--oh I mean fifteen!?
October 2, 2009 at 3:43 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
radioone (anonymous) says...
Here is more information for those interested in alternatives, instead of arguments. The choice doesn't have to be, 1. continue to smoke harmful cigarettes, or 2. quit...... Here is my solution... Give up your Tobacco Cigarette habit, but keep your smoking habit... How? Learn everything you need to know at www.notobacco.net
Enjoy!
October 4, 2009 at 8:57 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )