Hit & Run
Jump to full article: Reason Magazine, 2009-06-04
Author: Jacob Sullum
Intro: Manufacturers would have to demonstrate that their products are not merely safer than some of the existing alternatives. They would have to demonstrate that once the products enter the market, they would not have undesirable second-order effects such as encouraging smokers to switch instead of quit, or encouraging non-smokers to start who otherwise would not have started.
Meeting this kind of standard would be extraordinarily difficult; it is nearly a recipe to discourage the development of almost any new product no matter how much safer it would be than what smokers now use. . . .
As I said in a 2008 column, the central problem with this bill is that it seeks to prevent consumption rather than protect consumers, whose desires it aims to frustrate rather than satisfy.
Jump to full article » |