Highway Bill rider has a 900% tax aimed at e-cigs hidden in it....

[Gabe1291]

Just found this one out. but the new highway bill working it's way through congress at the moment has a nice 900% tax aimed at e-cigs hidden in it. They are not the only ones seeing a tax hike, but the one on e-cigs is the highest of the proposed hikes thrown in as a rider on the bill. Detailed tax info: Smokeless (electronic) cigarettes (a 900% increase) RYO (Roll Your Own) tobacco (a 250% increase) Little cigars (a 720% increase) Cigarettes (a 429% increase) just Cigarettes in general (a 429% increase)


Thought this is something that the community should be made aware of. The link to a petition against it on change.org is below. Looks like they are changing tactics on us, since they can't get their FDA pets to kill the e-cig, they're just going to try and tax it to death.


Economic Justice Petition: HUGE Tobacco increase hidden in Highway Bill | Change.org





Also found the bill itself, trying to sift through the lingo to find it specifically, but I'm an engineer not a lawyer >.< So here it is for the more legal lingo savvy. According to the records it's made it past the House and is in the Senate now.
Bill Text - 112th Congress (2011-2012) - THOMAS (Library of Congress)

 

[Placebo Effect]

SEC. 100116, while poorly worded, is only meant to apply to roll-your-own machines, and does not appear to impact e-cigarettes in any way.

 

[HunnyBunny]

Thank you for clarifying that Placebo Effect

 

[Screwbag]

It's rare to see any straightforward lawmaking anymore...there is always some back door BS that gets tacked on for the ride....

 

[Gabe1291]

Thanks placebo, I saw the petition, but couldn't translate the legal wording in the bill itself into something I could understand. Give me geometric and dimensional tolerances and I can read that, but that stuff in the bill

 

[Bill Godshall]

This petition is not only inaccurate, but it's nonsensical. Cigarette companies staunchly oppose cigarette tax hikes, and they'd spend billions of dollars lobbying against a 429% federal cigarette tax hike (i.e. from $1 to $5.29/pack).

This is a "Sin" tax on Tobacco type products. This will effectivly kill any small businesses that sell items such as smokeless (electronic) cigarettes (a 900% increase) RYO (Roll Your Own) tobacco (a 250% increase) Little cigars (a 720% increase) Cigarettes (a 429% increase) just Cigarettes in general (a 429% increase) It's the Big Tobacco companies' way of eliminating competition and making billions and billions of more cash.

 

[kristin]

People have been so brainwashed by the ANTZ rhetoric and lies that they think "big, evil tobacco" is behind just about every scheme to make money and/or kill people. Sure works well to take the spotlight off of the grossly unethical behavior of the FDA, ANTZ and Big Pharma.

 

[UnFettered_Soul]

This reads to me like government, and possibly big tobacco, is trying to tax those that sell roll your own products.
Including the machines and tobacco. Re-tax maybe, because quite a few of the tobacco sellers went to "pipe" tobacco after the last huge tax hike.

When the husband and I were still RYO, the company we mainly purchased from went to two separate web sites.
One for the tobacco and one for "everything else". They even admitted, like many loose tobacco sellers, that they went with a "pipe cut" because of pricing and tax changes, and that they could no longer sell the products with the tobacco.

They are saying those businesses that make a machine available for customer use are "guilty" of making cigarettes. And should be taxed the same as those selling pre-made.
I think. They reference subsections I couldn't find.

The only place I read anything about e-cigs was in the petition.

However..... it is my opinion that tobacco and money laundering (also mentioned in this bill) have no place in a highway bill.
The only people this would effect will be the "little guy", not the elite or corporations who may actually be guilty of "hiding money" to avoid taxes.

 

[kristin]

The whole RYO thing is a perfect example of the ANTZ underestimating how much smokers want to keep smoking and the repercussions of attempting social engineering. They KNOW that most smokers have lower incomes, but rather than give up one of the few "pleasures" they enjoy in life (as the ANTZ expected,) they get around the tax increases with RYO, black market, native reservations, online and crossing state lines. (And e-cigarettes.) The cannot accept that their price increases aren't making people quit, so they are starting to turn smokers into criminals for doing the things to avoid the cost, instead. The high taxes are supposed to be a solution to a problem. Instead, there are other problems popping up all over and people still aren't quitting smoking.

 

[tommy2bad]

I think price is seen as preventative rather than curative. The idea is to make the starting price of smoking so high that it becomes prohibitive to start smoking. The thinking is that if a low price point exists that will allow people to become smokers who will migrate to higher priced products.
Yes real world data contradicts this, people start with the high end cigarettes and once addicted move to lower cost alternatives but from a ANTZ point of view the real world is just an inconvenience they can rearrange to meet their agenda.
The total elimination of any and all tobacco products.

 

[kristin]

Except the ANTZ usually "sold" the tax increases to legislators and the public as a "proven and effective" way to get people to quit smoking, too.

And they claim that for every 10% increase, youth smoking is reduced 7% and overall smoking is reduced 4%. Yet the tax increases have not resulted in anywhere close to those numbers at all - and it doesn't even touch upon reducing youth initiation (ie. prevention vs. cessation.)

The average of state cigarette taxes in 2001 was 43.4¢ per pack and the average for 2009 was $1.34. The youth smoking rate in 2001 was reported at 28.5% and the youth rate was reported at 21.9% in 2009.

With about a 300% increase in taxes and a supposed 7% decrease in youth smoking for every 10% increase, where should the youth smoking rate have been by 2009? I calculate somewhere around 3.23%.

So much for significant "prevention."

Exorbitant cigarette and tobacco taxes are just a way to heavily tax 20% of U.S. citizens without public outcry, because the ANTZ have the rest of the public believing it's "win-win" by helping smokers and lowering taxpayers' health costs from smokers, while balancing government budgets. (And because THEY aren't having to pay higher taxes as long as smokers and tobacco users are footing the bill. Note very little of these taxes actually go to smoking cessation programs, too.)

 

[Vocalek]

Don't confuse them with the facts, Kristin.

 

[JENerationX]

I loved how the last proposed cigarette tax increase for NY state was hidden in a bill to extend education (I can't remember the exact wording but it was an education bill).... help the children by taxing the smokers. If they'd tried to raise school taxes, there would have been an outcry.

It's ridiculous that they HIDE the tobacco taxes in other bills. If they need money for road repair, raise tolls or the fee for licenses, registration etc. Need money for schools, raise school taxes. Why are the taxes on tobacco raised to foot the bill for everything????? It's mind boggling.

 

[Katatonik]

It's not raising the tax on anything. It is not adding a tax to tobacco in any shape or form. All it does is remove tax havens for people who build and sell RYO machines (not buy them). No big whoop. It's just closing a loophole.

And welcome to legislation 101. Few bills/acts are written that only talk about the title. It's a way to piggy back miscellaneous items that might be too contentious on their own.

 

[DC2]

The whole RYO thing is a perfect example of the ANTZ underestimating how much smokers want to keep smoking and the repercussions of attempting social engineering. They KNOW that most smokers have lower incomes, but rather than give up one of the few "pleasures" they enjoy in life (as the ANTZ expected,) they get around the tax increases with RYO, black market, native reservations, online and crossing state lines. (And e-cigarettes.) The cannot accept that their price increases aren't making people quit, so they are starting to turn smokers into criminals for doing the things to avoid the cost, instead. The high taxes are supposed to be a solution to a problem. Instead, there are other problems popping up all over and people still aren't quitting smoking.

This is the bottom line, and the thing that we all have to recognize and help fight.

The "quit or die" philosophy is ignorant and stupid, and it kills people.
The "harm reduction" philosophy is intelligent, correct, and what will help save lives that are not being saved yet.

 

[DEATHTOCIGS]

Someone should introduce a bill that provides a tax credit for people who have switched from analogs to e-cigs for driving down the cost of healthcare.

 

[DC2]

I loved how the last proposed cigarette tax increase for NY state was hidden in a bill to extend education (I can't remember the exact wording but it was an education bill).... help the children by taxing the smokers. If they'd tried to raise school taxes, there would have been an outcry.

It's ridiculous that they HIDE the tobacco taxes in other bills. If they need money for road repair, raise tolls or the fee for licenses, registration etc. Need money for schools, raise school taxes. Why are the taxes on tobacco raised to foot the bill for everything????? It's mind boggling.

Do you want to get angry?

Because this will make you mad...
https://www.popvox.com/bills/us/112/s1403

They tried to increase the tax on less harmful tobacco products while tying it to a bill to fund those with special needs.
Because they will do anything to try and bury us.


I think we, as a community, helped kill this bill.
At least I assume at this point it has been killed, and there is no doubt we as a community played some part in that.

I'm all for funding those with special needs.
But not at the expense of killing smokers.

 

[TennDave]

Do you want to get angry?

Because this will make you mad...
https://www.popvox.com/bills/us/112/s1403

As a school psychologist who works with these kids, I was totally appalled at this. I'm glad the bill was stopped, but who knows when it might rear its ugly head again. I plan to stay on top of this and fight it through every organization I belong to related to my work as well as through any other organization outside of work AND as a private citizen who knows that oranges shouldn't pay for apples...

 

[Bill Godshall]

Here are two news articles about the legislation mentioned in this thread.

Transportation funding bill approved by Congress contains provision to ban RYO machines Federal Highway Bill includes removal of RYO Tobacco machines - YNN, Your News Now
Roll-your-own cigarette businesses take hit | TribLIVE

 

[Bill Godshall]

Here's another article
Roll-your-own cigarette stores going up in smoke - Chicago Sun-Times