Slashdot Mirror
'Australia Is Stubbing Out Smoking' (bbc.com)
Australia was the first country in the world to introduce mandatory plain packaging for tobacco products. Now it is taking another strong stand, but will other countries follow suit? From an article on BBC, shared by an anonymous reader: It's not easy being a smoker in Australia.
The smoking bans started inside -- in workplaces, bars and restaurants -- and moved out. "Now, smoking is prohibited within 10m (33ft) of a playground, within 4m (13ft) of the entrance to a public building, at rail platforms, taxi ranks and bus stops," said Mark Driver, Sydney's Park and Recreation Planner. Those are the rules in New South Wales, but they are mirrored in many other states. Smoking is banned on many beaches, and most Australian states have now banned cigarettes in jail. All states ban smoking in vehicles if children are present. Fines vary, but in some places you may be fined AUD$2,000 (USD$1,515) if you smoke in the wrong place. And even if you don't, you'll be paying more than that each year by 2020, if you smoke just one AUD$40 pack a week. [...] These days, smoking is often taken up by people who are on the lowest rungs of the socio-economic ladder, Simone Dennis, an associate professor at Australian National University, points out, "and that adds a burden of shame to people who might already be marginalised." If it's the poor who are now the most likely to smoke, it's hard to see how they will ever afford the AUD$40 (USD$30) pack of cigarettes.
This is the correct approach. Banning it would seem silly and oppressive by many, taxing it for health reasons is perfectly fine.
How long will it take the government to extend this to diet and other lifestyles? Diet correlates more strongly than smoking to decreased lifespan. Do we have a nationally enforced vegan lifestyle? Since homosexual lifestyles for men result in larger health risks should we fine men for being gay? Selfishly, I would like to see this as a law here because I have loved ones that I would like to stop smoking but... slippery slope.
The only problem with "vice" taxes is that the state tends to become dependant upon that extra income. Once the actual vice is eliminated, through attrition or just getting fed up enough with the expense to target individuals, the state is suddenly over-budgetted (did I say that right?) and looking for ways to fill in the sudden deficit with taxes that burden everyone.
I hate being around people who have smoked (I think they grow insensitive to the smell and don't realize how it permeates everything they own).
This isn't true. It's true for current smokers, but it's not true, in my experience, for people who are former smokers. (You said, "people who have smoked", which implies former smokers.) Instead, IME, the former smokers are frequently the most ardently anti-smoking people you'll ever meet, and seem especially sensitive to the smell of cigarette smoke, and complain about it the most.
The world is moving at the moment to allow Marijuana to be legalized
No, it's not. The US was, but now that Trump is elected and Sessions is about to be appointed AG, that's going to come to a quick halt as the Federal government starts throwing pot smokers in prison for decades for simple possession. Jeff Sessions is a huge anti-marijuana crusader. Luckily I'm not a user of that, but I know people who are, and who are also big Trump fans, and it's really funny (and sad at the same time) to see them justify their fandom of Trump/Sessions (and specifically Sessions) and try to handwave away Sessions' anti-pot position, all because they hate Hispanics and Muslims so much.
However, seemingly the use of e-cigs or nicotine patches or other safer nicotine delivery would provide the same benefits at far lower risk.
A competent harm reduction strategy for nicotine consumers would require the abstinence-only anti-tobacco nut-jobs to allow new tobacco/nicotine products. E-cigs (still horribly under-regulated and under-studied) and such were perfectly possible in the 60s, but we got nowhere because we have fanatical idiots on one side of the issue and the shameless corporate lackeys on the other. It was only through a "flash mob"-like phenomena and the advancement of consumer-level tech to the point where a horde of hard-to-regulate single-owner e-commerce businesses could produce such technology profitably that e-cigs have gotten where they are today. They got so popular so fast (despite the crazy lack of any sort of real quality control) that the genie got out of the bottle before the crazier elements among the anti-smoking crowd could step on its throat.
Nicotine patches are IMO a pretty useless product; the lack of self titration is too huge a step away from the smoking experience for most... and I'd bet by the time you'd cut down to the point where you just wanted a baseline delivery rather than a rush, you'd be able to do without the patch.
Someone had to do it.
in the UK the costs of lung removals, limb amputations etc. etc fall on the NHS
Total taxes collected in the UK annually on cigarettes: £12 billion
Total budget of the entire NHS: £120 billion
Unless you're going to tell me that you think that cigarettes on their own account for a full 10% of all healthcare-related costs, I think it's safe to say that the "burden on the taxpayer" argument doesn't stand up even on its own merit (setting aside the moral question of whether offering people free healthcare gives you the right to control their behaviour).
For what it's worth, the Department of Public Health at Oxford University estimated that burden at £5 billion (in 2009, so let's adjust for inflation and call it £6 billion). Sounds to me like smokers are contributing about twice as much as they're costing, right?
-- Note to Mods: There is a good reason there's no "-1 Disagree" option. --
Forcing people to pay for the health care of other adults is wrong.
It's absolutely right and one of the best things about countries with social/subsidised healthcare. Shame on America for abandoning it.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Smokers who quit will cost less to the public health care system
And you know this how? Smokers usually die quicker, so don't burden the system as much. My Dad died from smoking, once he was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer, most of his health spending was on morphine with just a few days of hospital care. My Mom, who is a non-smoker, developed Alzheimers 15 years ago and just keeps hanging in there, in a condition that if she was a dog, would see us sentenced for animal abuse, eating up tons of healthcare dollars as she is completely incapable of caring for herself
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
Australia is unique in that it is an island continent. You can't just drive across the border to get some smokes.
You can fly in with your suitcase full of packs of cigarettes and have them taxed to hell and back in customs, or you can use a boat to go from the northern coast of Australia to PNG / Indonesia, which is not a short trip by any stretch.
Then you have to get your boatload of cigarettes that are boxed in bright, attractive packaging to your customers without arousing suspicion, because every pack of cigarettes in Australia is plain white with pictures of mouth cancer &etc on it by law. So you stuff about and put them all into little baggies, or whaterever, increasing your labour and distribution costs further.
So what will happen is that you'll have a few large black market operators that are regularly picked off by Customs, and black market cigarettes will be hard to come by, and hopefully people will just save themselves the hassle, quit smoking, and drink themselves to death instead with the money they've saved.
You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
There is a lot of hype here.
This isnt a dichotomy. I dont like sin taxes, its really that simple. You have people in countries with socialized medicine who now think they have the right to decide other's lifestyle choices without ever addressing things like coal miners and other hazardous jobs.
Good-bye
Interesting, but seems American biased, a country with high healthcare costs and low tobacco taxes.
Down the page there are a few references to studies done with the NHS which show the opposite. Probably need a meta-study to compare the different studies and take in different health systems.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism