Thursday, July 3, 2008

Higher Cig Taxes to Fund Massachusetts Plan

Categories: Massachusetts

Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick recently signed a cigarette tax hike into law to pay for the higher-than-expected cost of the Massachusetts health plan.

One supporter of the law welcomed its enactment by claiming:

"Increasing the tobacco tax is one of the most effective tobacco control strategies with the impact on our youth undeniable," said Marc Hymovitz, spokesman for the American Cancer Society. "The effect of this tax increase will be an estimated 25,000 smokers quitting and 46,000 youth never starting to smoke."

But, wait -- I thought this was supposed to be helping pay for health care. How can it do that if fewer people smoke? It seems that state legislators never learn that paying for a program that has increasing costs with a revenue source that decreases every year makes little fiscal sense.