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LET'S GET out of the way the
Yet let's recognize that Mr. Kaine's proposal represents a kind of classism. Cigarette smokers generally occupy the lower economic strata, which means that few of them inhabit the social sphere of governors and of the business and journalistic elites with whom the political class hobnobs. A cigarette tax, in short, is a tax on "them," not "us." Elites still like their microbrews, their merlots, and their double-malt Scotches, which is perhaps why Mr. Kaine isn't pushing higher taxes on another socially problematic substance, alcohol.
State Republicans and their polemical shops don't make the above argument, because they oppose all tax increases, including on Satan if he were an incorporated business or had a Social Security number. (Americans for Tax Reform reminds us that 30 Virginia legislators have promised in writing "to oppose any and all efforts to increase taxes.") They argue that raising the cigarette tax would throw people out of work. But the cigarette makers of Greater Richmond send their products all over the country, with Virginians consuming only 3 percent of all cigarettes domestically sold, notes city resident Peter Fisher of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. Philip Morris International boasts that it sells its wares to 160 nations. A tax increase in wee Virginia is going to bring 1933 to Richmond's South Side? Or cause the collapse of the Emphysema Empire?
ATR and the Republicans also say that Virginia smokers, confronted with an extra $3 charge on a carton, will flock to lower-cost border states to buy their Marlboros and Virginia Slims. But wait. If the Kaine proposal flies, the per-pack savings by border-state shoppers visiting the three adjacent states with lower cigarette taxes (Kentucky, North Carolina, West Virginia) would average 23 cents. The savings to smoking residents of Virginia's neighboring jurisdictions with higher cigarette taxes (Maryland, Tennessee, the District) who would shop here would average 95 cents. Virginia would retain a big surplus in income from bargain-chasing weed fiends.
No, the better argument against a ciggy-tax boost comes from the left: Virginians who are less well educated and paid would be discriminated against if made to shoulder the entire burden of righting the Medicaid account.
Mr. Kaine, citing federal data, says that smoking-linked illnesses cost the state $400 million a year in Medicaid expenses. But what of other iniquitous products and habits? The scarcely estimable toll of alcohol abuse includes everything from liver disease to fatal accidents to lost productivity. Obesity costs 12 percent of the U.S. health care budget, yet Mr. Kaine isn't targeting doughnut shops and KFC for extra taxes, or putting state levies on chocolate sin cake. The price tag of irresponsible sex is stupefying: In California in 2005, for example, 1.1 million new cases of sexually transmitted infections imposed a direct medical cost of $1.1 billion. But with the possible exception of Del. Bob Marshall, nobody in Richmond is talking about a promiscuity tax. Why should chaste smokers pay the medical freight for satyrs and tramps? And though the average problem gambler imposes social costs of at least $14,000 a year, it's inconvenient for Mr. Kaine to suggest taxing that vice, since the state, through the lottery, is its primary purveyor.
Verily, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of clean living--or at least almost all. This fact, at a time of fewer dollars to treat Virginia's sick and poor, argues for a general tax, not one pinned on a single group of self-abusers. If a doubled cigarette tax means fewer nicotine junkies, that's a very fine thing. But fairness? Cough-cough. Let's change the subject.
