Tobacco tax Archives - Granite Grok

The NH Tobacco Tax Increase is Not About Youth Smoking or Public Health…it is a Transfer of Wealth

September 26, 2018April 10, 2013 Steve MacDonald

Take some money and give it them

The Tobacco tax war is underway again, this time in the New Hampshire State Senate, as both sides debate the House passed 0.20 cent per pack tax hike before the Senate Ways and Means Committee. Supporters of the tax point to potential health benefits and a reduction in youth smoking. The Union Leader Article I draw this from is actually titled “Cigarette Tax Increase Seen as Deterrent to Youth Smoking,” but we already know that to be false.

According to the American Lung Associations own publications there has been absolutely no change in the middle-school smoking rate in New Hampshire since at least 2006, despite Democrats more than doubling the cigarette tax, taking it from 0.80/pack to 1.78/pack (plus a 65% wholesale price increase passed by Democrats in 2010).

The Lung Association’s reports for New Hampshire High School age smokers document the rate in 2006 at 20.5% (rising and falling) to settle in at 20.8% for 2010.

We also know that New Hampshire is consistently one of the healthiest states in the nation.

New Hampshire House Votes to Raise Tobacco Taxes

September 26, 2018March 21, 2013 Steve MacDonald

The ten cent resolution, that one thin (not so thin) dime New Hampshire Republicans cut off the tobacco tax two years ago, expires shortly. At the time it was proposed and passed the left was so insane with outrage that you’d have thought Republicans were selling guns to foreign drug lords across the border who were killing agents of the federal government and innocent civilians as well. But some Democrat president was the one who’d done that so there was no moral call to war; New Hampshire Democrats were as quiet as church mice. (Regular Church mice, the social justice Church mice are noisy sums-o-beeches–and likely protected by a stimulus grant through the EPA.) But that ten cent tax? That was a crime against humanity.

But it was probably doomed from the start.

Tobacco Tax Increase: The Progressives Racism And Class Warfare?

September 26, 2018March 21, 2013 Rick Olson

“Every man who repeats the dogma of Mill that one country is not fit to rule another country must admit that one class is not fit to rule another class.” ? B.R. Ambedkar

I read Steve’s entry this morning on the tobacco tax increase the house progressives just passed. HB 659-FN-A passed 193 to 167 largely right along party lines, bringing along the usual recognizable (and some Freshman) RINO’s. I think anybody that follows house voting behavior is not at all surprised or intrigued because those RINO’s sipping the progressive Kool-Aid ascribe to the notion that somehow fewer kids will smoke as the price of a pack increases. But the fact is, kids do pay taxes. When a 13-year-old

Lung Association Says Hike Cigarette Tax $1.00/Pack…for the Children

September 26, 2018January 16, 2013 Steve MacDonald

Problems with youth smoking — Does taxing cigarette’s actually reduce youth smoking in NH?

The American Lung Association would like New Hampshire legislators to increase the state’s tobacco tax by $1.00/pack. It is their opinion that this will reduce youth smoking and…they’d be more inclined to give us better grades.

The Lung Association gave the Granite State some of the lowest rankings in the Northeast in categories dealing with the cigarette tax, spending on tobacco prevention, smoke-free air and cessation programs.

It also noted that New Hampshire has the highest youth smoking rate in the region — 19.8 percent compared to 12.5 percent nationally — and that no state tax dollars are spent on programs to discourage smoking.

-Union Leader

Is the lung association prepared to compensate us for the 20% loss in sales revenue and secondary commerce to neighboring states as a result because the last time I checked, regardless of what the American Lung Association has to say about their special interest issue, New Hampshire is still consistently one of the top three healthiest states in the nation, year after year.

Oh, and then there’s this inconvenient truth…

Which Tax Lotto

September 26, 2018November 12, 2012 Steve MacDonald

New Hampshire House Democrats are going to raise taxes and fees, the real fun is which one first and how soon?

My money is on the tobacco tax and I’d be suprised if it didn’t hit the committee table on the first day of the first session and find it’s way to the House floor in record time. Given the somewhat spinless make-up of the Republican caucus in the State Senate, I could not guarantee that it wont just flush through that chamber like s**t through a goose and come out the other side with Maggie Hassan’s signature on it.

The end result will be fewer sales of cigarettes and tobbaco products in New Hampshire. That’s what happened the last time the Democrats raised the tobacco tax. And if we need a cautionary tale to guide us on why this will happen again, we can look to the Peoples Republic of Denmark for help.

When Progress Now Speaks – No One Should Listen

September 26, 2018June 20, 2012 Steve MacDonald

Zandra Rice Crispy-Treats Hawkins (ZRCTH) was on WGIR AM 610’s Political Roundtable the other morning with Andrew Manuse, Andrew in Studio, Zandra by phone–a strategic move that allowed her to suck up all of Andrew’s time because Andrew (in my opinion) was too polite to just talk over her. And Suck she did. But she is trained to suck. As the Progress Now sock puppet in New Hampshire she follows their plan to use whatever language is necessary to dupe the people in New Hampshire into embracing the Liberal/statist tax and spend agenda.

ProgressNow State Partners serve as non-stop, multi-issue advocacy organizations. Year-round, we promote progressive ideas and causes with creative earned media strategies, targeted email campaigns, and cutting-edge new media.

…

Political campaigns are relatively short-lived; they come and they go, leaving little behind of lasting value. ProgressNow’s presence in our states never ends.

…

ProgressNow State Partners excel in this area. Each ProgressNow State Partner organization has full-time staff who are experts in media communications, online campaigns, earned media and new media.

Put simply, ProgressNow (funded by progressive millionaires with more money than the Koch brothers) supports the state partners (like ZRCTH) and trains them to be experts in left wing propaganda tactics across all forms of media, with an emphasis on using local issues to advance national Democrat statist party goals.

So how did that work out?

Sylvia Larsen – Zipper head

September 26, 2018January 27, 2012 Steve MacDonald

I suppose you’ll want some context for that headline. Back in December (12/9/2011) I explained why New Hampshire should continue lowering tobacco taxes. I suggested we adopt some kind of schedule by which we would sunset tobacco taxes over the next decade based of the long term decline in sales. Why, after all, would you risk the states ability to invest in anything, including the left’s rhetorical “neediest residents in their most desperate hours (or something),” using an unreliable source of revenue in decline?

OK, what I actually said was

“Only a progressive zipper-head would rely on more revenue from something they want to get rid of. Increasing the tax on a declining market will only accelerate the unreliability of the revenue stream. That creates the opportunity for bigger budget holes that must then be filled on the fly.”

As if by magic, Sylvia Larsen, Democrat super-minoirty leader of the New Hampshire State Senate, in the face of declining unit sales, as fewer people smoke, after a decades long trend indicating that tobacco purchases will likely continue to decrease in the future, thinks we should increase our reliance on cigarette taxes in New Hampshire.

Zipper head. (doofus, goofball, goober, dunderhead, maroon, doh!) see note#2 below