http://www.pressconnects.com/apps/pb...WS01/806010373
New York is often criticized for taxing its residents to death.
Saving lives, however, is part of the reason state officials cite for $1.25 a pack cigarette tax increase effective Tuesday.
The hike from $1.50 to $2.75 a pack will make New York's cigarette tax the highest in the nation, raising the average price of cigarettes by more than 20 percent to more than $6 a pack. By contrast, cigarettes cost less than $4.50 a pack on average, including taxes, in northern Pennsylvania where the state tax is $1.35 a pack.
An informal survey of five area stores this weekend revealed smokers don't appear to be stocking up on cigarettes, perhaps because smokers can take a short drive into Pennsylvania where they pay $1.35 in tax per pack.
Pennsylvania is where Leslie Cooper of Manhattan plans to buy her and her husband's cigarettes.
Cooper, who owns a weekend home in East Branch in Delaware County, said, "We should stop smoking, but we're just going to go to Pennsylvania instead."
At least one local convenience store is considering halting the sale of cigarettes because they fear too much business will be lost over the border.
Joan Barton owns Barton's Market in Apalachin, which is located five miles from Pennsylvania. She said she plans to stock less cigarette brands and possibly might stop selling cigarettes.
"We'll see if they're willing to pay higher prices. A lot of them say they're going to quit," she commented.
Endicott resident Kari Reed, 34, said she'll consider quitting her less than a-pack-a-day habit because of the new tax, not to mention the increasing cost of gasoline and food. Reed said she has no problem with the cigarette tax hike.
"If you're going to smoke, pay the price to smoke because smoking is a luxury," she said.
Vestal Parkway Manley's Mighty Mart Supervisor Tom Fadden said considering people can barely afford gasoline he expects the cigarette tax to really hurt customers.
Fadden, 24, however, said he hopes the tax will inspire some people to quit because he knows the health risk. Fadden, who doesn't smoke, had a father who smoked two packs a day for years. Last June, his father died of throat cancer.
According to studies cited by the American Cancer Society, the most surefire way to get people to quit, especially youths, is to raise prices. A 10 percent increase, for example, is followed by a 6.5 percent reduction in the number of cigarette-smoking youths and a 2 percent reduction of the habit in adults.
A widely cited national study in 2006, the Tax Burden of Tobacco, also shows a state tax increase is always followed by increased revenues and decreased smoking, even taking into account smuggling and tax avoidance. A $1 per pack increase in Montana in 2005, for example, was followed by a 17.8 percent sales decline and $25.1 million in state revenue.
New York state officials expect the increase will generate $265 million in additional revenue, much of it to be used for health programs, including smoking cessation.
Audrey Silk of Citizens Lobbying Against Smoker Harassment, based in New York City, however writes that New York can expect less tax revenue next year from tobacco tax. She bases her opinion on analysis from Center for Policy Research of New Jersey which found New Jersey collected $23 million less in revenue from tobacco taxes in the fiscal year 2007 than the previous year after raising the tax $2.57 per pack.