Jump to full article: Richmond (VA) Times-Dispatch, 2002-08-26
Intro: According to a statewide poll, Virginians would support higher cigarette taxes to (1) ease the state's budget problems and (2) discourage smoking by the young. Hold the whoas. The survey's results qualify as a textbook case of suspicions confirmed. They do not surprise.
A hike in the tobacco tax represents an easy - perhaps the easiest - option. It's a levy others pay . .
One point of higher taxes is to discourage consumption. To the degree they succeed, they generate fewer dollars in excise taxes - and contribute to lower incomes and less employment in the tobacco industry. The tobacco farmer and the tobacco worker bear the brunt of the attack.
Although smokers did not create the revenue gap, momentum is building to make them pay. Commentators long have ridiculed policies based on blue smoke and mirrors. If higher tobacco taxes became Virginia's device for raising revenues, then truly it would be said that the state was balancing its budget with smoke.
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