Taxing Tobacco Seems to Fashionable in California
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Kevin Godbee - Jan 31, 2010
- 2 min read
California legislators are grasping at tax straws that don’t exist as they seek to raise billions of dollars that don’t exist for a balanced state budget that doesn’t exist, according to the International Premium Cigar & Pipe Retailers Association.
Two legislators – Democrat Assemblyman Tom Torlakson of Contra Costa County and Democrat State Senator Alex Padilla of Los Angeles – have introduced AB89 and SB600, respectively. The bills propose to increase tobacco taxes to as much as $2.10 per pack of cigarettes on top of the current $.87 per pack state tax and recently increased federal taxes of $1.00 per pack plus correspondingly stiff increases on other tobacco products like cigars and pipe tobacco.
"It’s easy to call these ‘tobacco taxes’, but the truth is they are discriminatory taxes that target some 15 percent of California adults who enjoy tobacco in one form or another , whether they smoke cigarettes or savor hand-made cigars" said Chris McCalla, legislative director of IPCPR.
"Real people pay these taxes… real people at all economic levels who vote and who have had enough overspending by government. They are customers of our more than 200 members throughout the state of California who are smoke shop owners and manufacturers or distributors of premium cigars and other tobacco products. They are, for the most part, small, family-owned businesses that employ thousands of their neighbors. As taxes go up and sales go down, their businesses are as threatened as the jobs of their employees and the sales, income and other taxes collected by the local, state and federal governments," McCalla said.
Proponents of increased tobacco taxes claim they will make it more difficult for under-aged individuals to purchase cigarettes.
"Higher taxes do not make it more difficult for teen-agers to purchase tobacco … they only make it more expensive for them and everyone else. If we want to keep kids from smoking – and we agree that everyone should support that goal – we should be enforcing the laws that are already on the books as do all members of the IPCPR," said McCalla.
McCalla disagreed with an editorial in a California newspaper (Wednesday, June 17, Los Angeles Times) that said increasing state tobacco taxes would be a "fair and constructive" way to find "balance" for the budget.
"The bills’ sponsors are estimating that these new, taxes on 15 percent of Californians might generate up to $2 billion as the state seeks to fill its $24 billion deficit. That is anything but fair, constructive or balanced," McCalla said.
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When I first started with the pipe as a quirky and precocious teen, the only tutelage I had at my disposal were scenes from old movies in which a well dressed chap would stick his pipe into a pouch, scoop tobacco into the bowl and press it down unceremoniously with his thumb. Then, with great flourish, he’d strike a match and light the thing with all manner of cinematic excess, puffing up vast clouds of smoke falling just short of completely obscuring his visage. While it may look good on film, it’s a terrible approach to actually enjoying the thing. Somehow, though, this “technique” seems to have survived in the contemporary vernacular, at least to some extent, even with bit-loads of information handily at our fingertips that should dissuade us from the practice. 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Before we begin, I should tell you: this tobacco review is being written by an A.I. Not the fancy new GPTs or their ilk; no, this is last century’s meat-and-bone, all-organic model. To be fair, a large part of what we call knowledge is merely the accumulated perceptions and impressions gathered from a life wandered through, synthesized into a spongy mass of what-it-is-that-we-think-that-we-know. The algorithm for this prompt is simple enough: pump thousands of bowls of smoldering plant matter into a gaping maw, cross-reference the chemical sensations with all other matter previously ingested or inhaled, sieve it all through the diffuse and fractal twin lens of memory and emotion, and churn out a panoply of adjectives that attempts to convey the sensations to someone who hasn’t experienced it yet. Odds are that a diligently trained monkey could succeed half the time; if this reviewer nears fifty-one percent then that would qualify as an unrivaled success. 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I started out my tasting in cobs, then cut short an unpleasant bowl in a meer, and finally landed on my best instrument with the lovely Dunhill 4427 pictured, a quaint group 4 shell briar with a gentle curve and Cumberland stem supporting a perfectly executed acorn bowl. It surprised me here, as I’ve learned through the years that I generally have the best experience with English blends in large, wide bowls. With this blend it seems that to get the best out of the Katerini’s somewhat diaphanous influence the smaller bowl fared much better. Room note is very English, so the company you keep will either love it or hate it, and it doesn’t linger too much. I find it paired best with a strong coffee; Sumatran beans complement the flavors well, as do Ethiopian if a lighter brew is preferred. Overall impressions of the blend are that it’s a curiously interesting take on the English genre, almost a reductive reconstruction of the theme using the unique components. 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California would TAX each footstep or breath of air a person took if they could figure out how to do it… I better not give them any ideas…
Phil,
Yikes, please don’t give them (especially Padilla) any ideas. How do we get the people of California (and elsewhere) motivated enough to vote these people out of office?
California feels the need to tax luxury items, so the citizens will forget what an fd-up job the state government has done with the real state problems. Like, water, power, and illegals: which which are overloading all services. God forbid taxing factories, farms, and any other businesses that are hiring people who are in this country illegally. You never see a skinny illegal. Most are obese, with 5 obese kids, which also overloads health care. California should tax fast foods. That would pay for many things. I am not blaming the people. I feel pity.
When are we going to realize that the politicians like Padilla, Jenny Oropeza, and
Tom Torlakson are guilty of a conflict of interest which prevents them from representing All of the People, including citizens who smoke?
These unjust attacks defy the State Constitution and the Rights to Property and the Pursuit of Happiness. As such, if you oppose tobacco, you may exercise your opinion, you may educate other according to the facts, but you May Not attack through biased laws the Rights of Citizens to use tobacco by Our State Constitution or by the 9th Amendment.
As for curbing teen smoking, any attempt by the government to price a product out of reach of consenting adult citizens seems to me to be an anti-trust violation same as price-fixing to defeat competition.
In the State of California, the sovereignty of the government belongs to The People.