New York Raises Price of Cigarettes to Eleventy!!!!11! Dollars Per Pack

...at least in New York City.

Earlier this week, the New York State legislature passed yet another one-week budget extender. This latest bill included provisions to raise the state tax on cigarettes by $1.60 on July 1, and on September 1, to collect (so says New York) tax on tobacco sold to non-indigenous visitors to tribal lands coterminous with New York State.

There's certainly commentary to be had on what now passes for New York's legislative process. We don't exactly have a great track record.

There's also commentary to be had about the following truths:
1) New York has a massive budget deficit.
2) Cigarettes are unhealthy (and in turn, presumably drive up medical costs).

Of course, I'd rather blather on about responsibility.

Excise taxes on tobacco are politically safe. Everyone, seemingly, loves to hate those reprehensibly irresponsible smokers.

I see a few massive problems with heavy reliance on hatred-based taxation.

This particular tax hike is condescending, and as I said, based on hatred of particular groups of people. See also, the proposed NYS tax on sugary beverages.

Speaking of “particular groups of people”, I believe I've already mentioned that members of certain demographics are more likely to be targeted by cigarette marketers, and/or are more likely to smoke than others: people of color and/or LGBT people and/or lady people, as opposed, say, to straight white guys. As for hatred of indigenous people, yeah, there's a bit of that going on, too. Again.

In these tough times, it strikes me that it's been increasingly common for politicians to bemoan folks' lack of responsibility, and to talk of how we all need to sacrifice. People who rely on social services need to sacrifice. People who provide social services need to sacrifice. Teachers and others public employees need to sacrifice. Smokers need to sacrifice. People who buy shoes need to sacrifice. Indigenous tribes need to sacrifice (actually, that last one's usually a little less polite :ahem:).

This is all very interesting, given that I haven't heard much about the requirement for certain other people to make responsible sacrifices. These are largely the same folks whose continuous irresponsibility helped put New York (and much of the country) in the hole in which it now finds itself. Perhaps we could spend more time discussing the impact of an increasingly regressive tax structure (including a growing reliance on excise taxes and user fees). I haven't heard either the Demopublican or Tea Party Parties discuss this lately, so I thought I'd throw it out there for kicks. Have at it.