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Lost jobs in Wisconsin was an argument used against a statewide smoking ban that will go into effect next year. But two other Midwestern states that have smoking bans say they has not significantly affected employment in restaurants and bars.
Before Minnesota and Ohio approved their bans, restaurant and bar owners said they’d lose business if customers weren’t allowed to smoke. But researchers from those states who tracked employment data over three years found job loss was very minimal, not even statistically relevant. . . .
Although there are only predictions of what economic impact a statewide smoking ban will have, there are community examples. In Madison, public health officials noted that there was more liquor licenses sold after the city’s ban was enacted in 2005.
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For years tobacco companies have successfully fought off attempts by California lawmakers and health groups to increase the cigarette tax. But next month, as the state grapples with the worst financial crisis in recent history, that may change.
Lawmakers will consider a proposal to hike cigarette taxes by $1.50 per pack and raise $1.2 billion annually. During the last decade, cigarette makers have spent tens of millions of dollars to kill 14 straight attempts to make smokers pay more.
The federal government plans to introduce legislation Tuesday that, if passed, would make good on a campaign promise to ban flavoured tobacco products that are considered appealing to children.
The bill, "An Act to Amend the Tobacco Act," also is expected to mandate that mini-cigars, called cigarillos, must be sold in packages of at least 20, and that all tobacco advertising and promotion in print and electronic media that may be viewed and read by young people is prohibited.
More details will be revealed when the bill is introduced in the House of Commons by Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq, but according to the Conservative party platform that was released during the fall 2008 election, the proposed measures will "help to prevent the exploitation of children by the tobacco industry."
Manufacturers of cigarillos, however, say they do not target children and that not enough research has been done by the government to justify the legislation.
There is a bit of good news in the economy for convenience store retailers, according to Nik Modi, sector analyst at New York City-based UBS Securities LLC, during CSPNetwork's Tobacco Update CyberConference. . . .
Food prices have come down slightly in the past year, and gasoline prices have nearly been cut in half, loosening the wallets of 60% of cigarette smokers—who make less than $40,000 annually. According to Modi, last year at this time gasoline prices were about $3.74 per gallon, and they are currently around $2.24, with the savings equating to the price of 209 packs of Marlboros or 142 tins of Copenhagen per year.
Modi also addressed the big question on most tobacco retailers' minds, how the federal excise tax (FET) increase will impact the industry. Based on historical price elasticity calculations, he said that he expects the tobacco industry to decline 8% to 10%, which would roughly be 4% to 6% worse than the normal trend rate of decline. After the next 12 months, Modi expects industry decline rates to return more or less to normalized levels, however.
Premium cigarette brands will likely be "less affected,"
Download individual sections
1. Introduction [pdf 925kb]
2. The importance of packaging [pdf 924kb]
3. Consumers do not know enough about the health risks of tobacco use [pdf 5.06Mb]
4. Health warnings on packages do work [pdf 4.82Mb]
5. How to make warnings most effective [pdf 4.30Mb]
6. Countering tobacco industry arguments against effective health warnings [pdf 2.55Mb]
7. A call to action [pdf 356kb]
8. Picture gallery (by WHO region) [pdf 4.66Mb]
9. References, acknowlegments, credits [pdf 291kb]
A quarter of all deputies in Parliament are smokers and they are being lobbied by certain businesses to delay the second stage of the smoking ban, a survey has revealed.
Experts from Hacettepe University Public Health Branch conducted a survey among parliamentary deputies on smoking habits and the prevention of smoking in public places. According to the related law, restaurants, teahouses, cafes and pubs will be added to the already smoke-free places after June 19. Lobbyists, including restaurant and cafe owners, are putting pressure on deputies to delay the implementation of the second stage.
One-third quit smoking
The survey was conducted among 246 deputies. Results showed 22 percent of deputies smoked every day and 4.5 percent smoked occasionally. The rate of deputies who had quit smoking stood at 29.8 percent, while those who had never smoked numbered 43.7 percent.
A coalition of 40 health organisations has launched an initiative to ban smoking in all buildings open to the public across Switzerland.
About half of the country's 26 cantons already have rules regulating smoking in bars and restaurants, but proponents of the campaign say the country's laws are too disjointed and do not go far enough.
"We have a very peculiar situation in Switzerland," Otto Piller, president of the Swiss Lung League, told swissinfo.ch on Monday. "The way it is now, you can have a town that sits on the border between canton Solothurn, which forbids smoking, and canton Aargau, which does not, meaning half the town allows smoking and half does not. It's an impossible situation."
The new law, if passed, would make any room open to the public smoke free, including those in restaurants, bars, schools and hospitals.
The owner, a tall, slim, 50ish blonde named Chauvin Marc, knows the cash register will not brim with euros when she leaves tonight. “The young are quitting the bars because of the smoking ban,” she says. “It's also because of the [economic] crisis.”
She looks out the window. “The street is a little sad.”
Ms. Marc is not alone. All across France, cafés and bars are closing by the thousands and their mortality rate seems to be accelerating because of the recession, changing drinking and dining habits, and the stress induced by the money culture.
Work beckons and the French don't linger at cafés, bars and restaurants like they used to.
The smoking ban, introduced early last year, did a lot of damage, say café and bar owners. Penelope Semavoine, a young Parisian who works in public relations, notices that the cafés are particularly empty in the winter. “The cafés I go to are still full, but only in the summer, when the smokers can pull a chair outdoors,” she says.
(First of two parts) . . .
Fisherman Lino Bocalan became legend in the 1950s to 1960s after he chanced upon an alternative and more lucrative profession: cigarette smuggling. . . .
Before long, Bocalan built a fortune and a name in an industry that grew in Tanza, aided in part by the presence of Sangley Point, a former American base where blue-seal cigarettes were sold and taken out from its commissary. He eventually traded directly with Borneo, cut the southern connection, and became a millionaire.
Decades later, the Tanza cottage industry has evolved into a lucrative national, and even a global, industry. The southern backdoor, where traders of smuggled cigarettes used to taunt law enforcers, has become an outmoded entry point. Smugglers have become more brazen, preferring direct payoffs to willing takers. . . .
There are only five major players in this highly protected industry. Lucio Tan’s Fortune Tobacco and Philip Morris Philippines Manufacturing Inc. corner over 90 percent of the local market. The smaller players include Mighty Corp., La Suerte Cigar & Cigarette Factory, and Associated Anglo-American Tobacco Corp. . . .
International organizations and groups working to stop the tobacco black market and curb cigarette smoking are sounding alarm bells because the illegal trade is believed to finance criminal syndicates that engage in drugs, trafficking, terrorism, and money laundering.
Two U.S. senators are aiming to snuff out dissolvable smokeless-tobacco products before they can get a toehold in the U.S. market.
Their amendment to the proposed FDA regulation bill from Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., is stoking the debate regarding the viability and possible less-hazardous role of smokeless tobacco products.
U.S. Sens. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., and Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, have labeled as "tobacco candy" the three dissolvable products being test marketed by R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.
The senators say that the dissolvable products are aimed at getting youths hooked on tobacco and nicotine. They said that some of the products are sold in containers "designed to resemble cell phones."
"There is no doubt that smokeless tobacco products are aimed squarely at children,"