http://www.tobacco.org/newsfeed/category/tax.rss Latest top tobacco news headlines en-us http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=4a3b8eb9-e353-47e2-9b88-67c5e99fab76 http://tobacco.org/news/270486.html Tuesday's Citizen reported a StatsCan's finding that smoking has not declined in the past three years and a Canadian Cancer Society spokesman's irritated response, "The reason the smoking rate stopped going down is because of the serious contraband situation. . . . Apparently one cannot say often enough, in public policy, that individuals insist upon weighing alternatives and making decisions for themselves. . . . Whether they enjoy smoking more than I do or like other aspects of being alive less, they haven't decided to quit. Like myself, they weigh the costs including monetary, but the math comes out differently. . . . At some point we need to weigh the gains from further discouraging smoking against the costs of spreading illegality and corruption. . . . Smoking may be dumb. But a policy that corrupts citizens and police, and that menaces public safety, needs very strong positive effects to pass the test of common sense. Does further discouragement of smoking, at this point, seem to you to qualify? The rush of bossing people about, the tingly puritanical pleasure of snatching peoples' glowing cigarettes from their very lips and stamping them out in front of their faces is a short-term pleasure that comes at too high a long-term cost. Time to give it up. Ottawa Citizen rkwarner@thecitizen.canwest.com (John Robson) Canada Fri, 29 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.canada.com/theprovince//topics/bodyandhealth/story.html?id=97f95b84-af1b-4ac9-8bb4-cc4835212957&k=96166 http://tobacco.org/news/270448.html Published: Tuesday, August 26, 2008 EDMONTON - If anti-tobacco groups get their way, Albertans could soon be spending some extra cash for every pack of cigarettes. The Campaign for a Smoke-Free Alberta, a group of health agencies, including the Alberta Cancer Board and the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Alberta, N.W.T. and Nunavut, is calling for a tax hike of at least $2 per pack to deal with what it calls an affordability issue with tobacco. The group says Alberta's booming economy has outpaced taxes on tobacco products, making cigarettes more affordable here for people 15 to 24 than in any other province. Vancouver Province tabtips@png.canwest.com Canada Tue, 26 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.canada.com/calgaryherald/news/city/story.html?id=f542b148-bcd1-4c45-ab20-9b9575f9409d http://tobacco.org/news/270447.html An anti-smoking coalition is pressing the provincial government to hike taxes on cigarettes, arguing young people are benefiting from the hot job market and have more cash to buy smokes. But the government says it's not contemplating any changes, noting tobacco taxes have been increased several times in the past few years. The Campaign for a Smoke-Free Alberta argues cigarettes sold in Alberta are the most affordable in Canada for people between the ages of 15 and 24, as this groups makes a higher average hourly wage compared with counterparts in other provinces. Tobacco companies are also offering discount cigarettes, the group said. The smoking rate for Albertans more than 15 years old sits at 21 per cent, according to recent Health Canada data. Calgary Herald submit@theherald.canwest.com (Richard Cuthbertson, Calgary Herald ) Canada Wed, 27 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.csnews.com/csn/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003843029 http://tobacco.org/news/270387.html Due to an upcoming busy Senate calendar and a possible veto, the bipartisan support for the Food and Drug Administration’s authority to regulate tobacco might be put on hold until next year, Dow Jones Newswires reported. If the bill became a law, it would have a dramatic effect on publicly traded companies such as Reynolds American Inc. (RAI), Lorillard Inc. (LO) and Altria Group Inc. (MO), the report stated. Provisions in the bill would give the FDA limited authority to monitor smoking products and ban flavored cigarettes, with an exemption for menthol-flavored cigarettes. Dow Jones Newswires reported if passed, the legislation could impose controls on advertising that restrict companies to plain, black and white "tombstone" advertisements and stop the use of the terms “low tar" and "mild." Convenience Store News Tue, 26 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/Story.asp?Article=227017&Sn=WORL&IssueID=31155 http://tobacco.org/news/270339.html Gulf states will study a proposal next week to raise the customs duties charged on tobacco imports to 200 per cent from 100pc, an executive at the UAE Federal Customs Authority said. Prices for cigarettes in the Gulf are cheap relative to global standards, costing between four dirhams (400 fils) and seven dirhams (700 fils) per box. The GCC customs union committee, which is set to meet in Riyadh on Sunday, will discuss whether to double the levy on cigarettes Gulf Daily News Uae Mid-east Fri, 22 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.leadercall.com/opinion/local_story_235103758.html?keyword=secondarystory http://tobacco.org/news/270331.html Republicans in the Mississippi Legislature have suddenly gotten religion when it comes to raising the state's ludicrously low tax on cigarettes. Republican lawmakers have spent the last several years helping Gov. Haley Barbour block efforts to raise the tax, including during the recent fruitless special session. Now some GOP leaders, including Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant, are saying let us take another crack at it in yet another special session in September or October. . . . Bryant, however, actually may have a good idea to pass the tax hike first, then haggle in January over what to do with it. There are going to be a host of ideas -- many of them worthwhile, some of them stinkers -- about what to do with the proceeds. We can see the whole effort bogging down over how to spend the money and nothing getting enacted. The revenue potential is only half of the motivation for raising the tax. The other is making cigarettes more expensive so that more smokers are enticed to quit and fewer young people ever start. Laurel Leader-Call Fri, 22 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://business.inquirer.net/money/topstories/view/20080821-155897/High-court-upholds-higher-taxes-on-new-cigarette-brands http://tobacco.org/news/270330.html The Supreme Court has declared as constitutional a section of the tax code that levies higher taxes on cigarette brands that entered the market after 1996. The Court declared as invalid certain sections of issuances of the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) in that these gave the bureau the power to reclassify or update the classification of new cigarette brands every two years or earlier. "As modified, this Court declares that: (1) Section 145 of the NIRC [National Internal Revenue Code], as amended by Republic Act 9334, is constitutional; and that (2) Section 4(B)(e)(c), 2nd paragraph of Revenue Regulations No. 1-97, as amended by Section 2 of Revenue Regulations 9-2003, and Sections II(1)(b), II(4)(b), II(7), III (Large Tax Payers Assistance Division II) II(b) of Revenue Memorandum Order No. 6-2003, insofar as pertinent to cigarettes packed by machine, are invalid insofar as they grant the [BIR] the power to reclassify or update the classification of new brands every two years or earlier," said a Court decision authored by Associate Justice Consuelo Ynares-Santiago. The case began at the Makati City Regional Trial Court Branch 61, which upheld the validity of the questioned section of the tax code and the BIR issuances. The petitioner, British American Tobacco (BAT), brought the case to the Supreme Court. Philippine Daily Inquirer Philippines Thu, 21 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.myfoxdc.com/myfox/pages/News/Detail?contentId=7269991&version=1&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=TSTY&pageId=3.2.1 http://tobacco.org/news/270329.html in just a little over a month D.C.'s cigarette tax doubles to $2.00, something diehard smokers don't like one bit. "Absolutely not," said Don Zimmerman, a smoker. "Like we're not taxed enough already?" "It hurts me, cause if it goes up another dollar, I won't want to smoke anymore," said Jimmy Rauch. The D.C. City Council signed off on the plan just this week. The goal is to raise money to help fund a health plan for the city's roughly 25,000 uninsured. The new tax could double the nearly $20 million the city takes in each year. WTTG Fox 5 Fri, 22 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://business.inquirer.net/money/breakingnews/view/20080821-155937/Legality-of-higher-tax-on-cigarettes-upheld http://tobacco.org/news/270328.html The Supreme Court on Wednesday declared as constitutional a provision of the National Internal Revenue Code (NIRC) which levies higher taxes on cigarette brands that entered the market after 1996. The high court en banc unanimously affirmed the constitutionality of Section 145 of the NIRC that levies new cigarette brands at their current net retail price and existing brands at their net retail price as of Oct. 1, 1996. It also nullified two regulations imposed by the Bureau of Internal Revenue to implement the NIRC provision which empowered the bureau to reclassify or update cigarette brands every two years or so. The case arose from a suit brought in 2003 by the British American Tobacco (BAT) Philippine Daily Inquirer Philippines Thu, 21 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.wiba.com/cc-common/news/sections/newsarticle.html?feed=118857&article=4136749 http://tobacco.org/news/270313.html State Revenue Department officials are confiscating more illegal cigarettes now than ever before, according to spokeswoman Jessica Iverson. Department agents seized around 12,000 illegal cigarettes in the fiscal year ending June 30th compared to around 3,000 the year prior. The state increase the cigarette tax by $1 to $1.77 January 1. WIBA AM Fri, 22 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://ftl.nypress.com/21/34/news&columns/feature.cfm http://tobacco.org/news/270273.html We pulled out of the train station onto a desiccated main drag of Mastic, NY--all tilting delis and RadioShacks--and rolled into a woodsy suburbia. "Where exactly on the reservation do you want to go?" the driver asked, and I said anywhere on Squaw Lane would be fine. He nodded, but he probably could have guessed where to drop me without asking. I was carrying a backpack. I had just gotten off the LIRR. I was obviously a New Yorker in town to score . . . Crossing the street to the big trading post, I noticed the crop of vehicles had rotated in its entirety. A woman in an SUV was ordering take-out cigarettes at the smoke shop's drive-thru. I walked past the teenager on the steps and into the store. ... excise taxes inevitably punish young, poor and minority smokers disproportionately to their more affluent, predominately white counterparts. Add to that the continuing ambiguity over tobacco's place in popular culture (Mad Men offers an illicit fix of smoking porn every week), the massive disparities between states' stamp duties and Bloomberg's monomaniacal anti-cigarette rhetoric--and the moral and economic, if not medical, consequences of smoking--become increasingly difficult to dissect. "Cigarettes are a legal product," argues Audrey Silk .. . Silk, with a voice like a trash compactor, sounds as if she had been smoking packs in her sleep since the '60s. For a woman who advocates for the inalienable rights of smokers, I can't think of a more persuasive poster child to dissuade kids from lighting up. Then again, the current generation of 18- to 24-year-old smokers, myself included, are as willfully ignorant as anyone that our nicotine fix won't eventually kill us. I smoked my first cigarette when I was 16, and never really stopped. It was a few years later that I realized that every bit of anti-smoking propaganda I'd heard as a child was effectively true. . . . Visiting the reservation, one is struck not only with the scale of the operation--a dozen or more stores within yards of each other--but the seemingly uninhibited desire to expand. All around the block, construction crews were erecting new stores, and outside the existing sellers, residents had erected mountains of cartons on foldout tables. The entire population, it seemed, had cohered around a single business model. Even Chief Wallace has his office inside a smoke shop. . . . the incident still served as fodder for critics of the reservation's practices, indicating simultaneously that enormous sums of money were being made in the absence of tax enforcement and that infiltrating the community from the outside, as Mullen had done by marrying a Native American woman, was not particularly difficult. While Mullen had no proven terrorist ties, the basic message gleaned from the scandal remained consistent with Bloomberg and King's warning: Violence and disorder were inherent to the continued forbearance of the state. The reservations must be forced to tax their customers. What these arguments fail to acknowledge is that criminal consequences occur on both sides of the legislation. While cracking down on reservation sales may mean the curtailing of certain smugglers, it also may lead to more felonies being committed in the city in the name of cigarettes. New York Press blog@nypress.com (Ben Lasman) Thu, 21 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.wapt.com/money/17236425/detail.html?rss=jac&psp=news http://tobacco.org/news/270242.html A study group appointed by Gov. Haley Barbour is recommending that Mississippi increase its cigarette tax to 50 cents a pack. The tax study commission met for several hours Tuesday at the state Agriculture Museum. The group is trying to release a final, comprehensive list of suggested changes for the tax code by next week. The commission voted to recommend the current 28 cent tax be increased by 32 cents, to reach a total of 50 cents. AP Wed, 20 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080819/OPINION01/808190330/1008/OPINION http://tobacco.org/news/270215.html As expected, the commission did recommend increasing the state tobacco tax with a couple of suggestions on how much - which appear designed to keep the tax in line with surrounding states or the South. While Barbour has been a staunch opponent of such a tax increase and has successfully blocked it in the Legislature, he now says he will not oppose it in line with his own commission's recommendation. That is a step forward. It now will be up to the Legislature to decide how much and how to spend it. Lawmakers should make it a first order of business. Jackson Clarion-Ledger Tue, 19 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080819/NEWS/80819024 http://tobacco.org/news/270214.html A commission studying Mississippi taxes today recommended hiking the state's 18-cent cigarette tax to 50 cents per pack. The increase, if approved by the legislature and Gov. Haley Barbour, would bring Mississippi's tobacco tax in line with surrounding states. Barbour, a Republican who appointed members of the commission, has said he would not oppose their recommendation. Jackson Clarion-Ledger natalie.chandler@clarionledger.com (Natalie Chandler ) Tue, 19 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT http://www.djournal.com/pages/story.asp?ID=277767&pub=1&div=Opinion http://tobacco.org/news/270213.html A draft of Gov. Barbour's Blue Ribbon Tax Study Commission report reveals broadly based opportunities for reforming Mississippi's tax system, but some of the draft's options fall short of what some had hoped would be a more aggressive shift on sales taxes, particularly involving food and cigarette taxation. . . . We agree with those who say raising the cigarette tax would provide a disincentive to smoking, especially among adolescents. The 18-cent tax in force now isn't a disincentive to anything except better health. There is consensus by the international medical community that cigarette smoking puts individuals at higher risk for many diseases - cancer, heart disease, emphysema, stroke, and arteriosclerosis, to name several - and the treatment is expensive. The same consensus exists that Medicaid bears a significant portion of those treatment costs. The issue is the size of the Medicaid program's costs. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention places nationwide cost at billions for all the states in treating smoking-induced illness, and between $50 million and $100 million at a minimum is spent in Mississippi through Medicaid. The cost will rise unless smoking is stemmed. Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal DJWebmaster@djournal.com Tue, 19 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT