EDITORIAL: Rise in cigarette tax can fix health woes 

All the while, legislators have stubbornly ignored the most obvious revenue generator: increasing the state tax on cigarettes.

Georgia's 37-cent state tax on a pack of cigarettes is 44th lowest in the nation. Raising the tax by $1 could generate $298 million . . .

Cigarette taxes are also apparently one tax that most taxpayers can stomach fairly easily. Polling for the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids found that 75 percent of Georgians favor increasing the tobacco tax by $1. Support was more than 70 percent among both Democrats and Republicans, and at 63 percent among smokers.

That seems like just the political cover Perdue and other lawmakers need.

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