Puff away ... smokers say they will keep on smoking
Australia's Prohibition on cigarettes is bound to fail...
History proves it...
Posted on 05/01/2010 1:36:09 AM PDT by myknowledge
RETAIL chains were reporting an unprecedented rush on cigarettes last night ahead of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's 25 per cent price rise, with some doubling their daily sales within a matter of hours.
One woman was refused service at a Woolworths in the Canberra suburb of Belconnen after trying to buy $5000 worth of cigarettes before the midnight deadline.
She was knocked back because Woolworths imposes a limit of five cartons per person.
Another Canberra Woolworths store reported sales of $23,000 by 6.30pm yesterday - the supermarket's average daily tobacco turnover is $10,000.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailytelegraph.com.au ...
Puff away ... smokers say they will keep on smoking
Australia's Prohibition on cigarettes is bound to fail...
History proves it...
The Aussie’s voted for European socialism. They are struggling as is but soon to join Greece and Spain.
How progressive! The west is imploding.
Giving birth to yet another criminal enterprise.
There would be gang wars and Al Capones running amok in my home country Australia, monopolizing the black market cigarette trade.
>>>>”Australia’s Prohibition on cigarettes is bound to fail...”
It is as usual about REVENUE for Gov’t(s).
GST was a major one (John Howard’s gov’t introduced that one soon after it got elected in mid 1990’s).
Australia had a surplus after John Howard bowed out, but not much investment in much needed essential infrastructure in Australia.
Kevin Rudd, on the other hand, spent so much to *apparently* keep us out of Recession during the recent Global Financial Crisis. Then, some infrastructure which we are yet to see the benefits of! Of course we have to pay for the (careless) Spend!
Money doesn’t grow on trees, labor or liberal (In U.S. terminology Dems or Republicans). It has to be sourced from somewhere.
Now, in an election year in OZ, people will have to start coughing up to make up for our deficit incurred by Rudd’s gov’t in yrs to come. It will remain regardless of who will be elected later this year in Australia.
ETS (tax) for so-called “Climate Change” wasn’t to be & got shelved. So, we got the one for Cigarettes, Gamblers on “poker machines” to come, and perhaps a few more taxes targetted at specific sections of the society to generate Revenue for the Gov’t.
Talk about really bad overall management & Stay Tuned for the next episode!
Tax on loose tobacco went up 2200% in this country last year. The tax alone more than doubled the price.
Loose leaf tobacco went from $15 lb to $75 lb overnight.
rebranding to Class L brought the price down to about $38 lb.
I can hardly wait to see the looks on peoples faces when the taxes get passed along to non smokers.
You tobacco taxing idiots cant tax smokers alone forever.
BTW, If you grow your own you are still subjected to the tax.
All this tax was to pay for SCHIP which is broke already in AZ, in less than a year.
Major tax increase in Washington state goes into effect today. So I’ve been stocking up this last week.
I tried to start a thread about it, but I will ask the question here:
If government gets to the point where they are making 4-5-6-7 dollars a pack, and they KNOW AND ADMIT that smokers/tobacco users are a somewhat addicted lot, then WHAT DIFFERENTIATES GOVERNMENT FROM SOME SHADY GUY WHO STANDS ON THE CORNER SELLING NICKLE BAGS OF WHITE POWDER?
Nuthin. They have no legal or ethical or moral foundation.
I’m not unsympathetic. But you could try and quit. My dad managed to quit after smoking at least a pack-a-day for 40 years. Now he just wishes he could get all that money back.
The smokers can go away, but the tax will remain.
It will just be passed along to something else.
You nonsmokers dont seem to understand that the programs that these taxes support are still there.
They dont go away when smokers quit
The smokers can go away, but the tax will remain.
It will just be passed along to something else.
You nonsmokers dont seem to understand that the programs that these taxes support are still there.
They dont go away when smokers quit
>>>>”They are struggling as is but soon to join Greece and Spain.”
lol! You maybe right in your part of the world, and you could also very much hold your breath at this end of the world.
But I’m not talking about me. I’m talking about the STATE.
I admit to being a decadent low life.
But the whole purpose of THE STATE seems based on some moral philosophy. To protect our rights. To give us the freedom to be all that we can be. To encourage the general welfare, but still allow for individualism.
At what point, at how many dollars per pack of taxes, does THE STATE become a complicit conspirator?
I have argued for years that the state has no right to try to set social policy. Society will be what it will or will not, but not because THE STATE wants it one way or another.
That’s why all kinds of laws, like affirmative action laws, etc., are complete idiocy.
Hey, someöne has to pay for the Gubmint to take the insulation out of houses.
Unfortunately & Sadly that’s true.
I'm not unsympathetic either. I went in the hospital on August 6th, 2008 for gall bladder surgery, of course they wouldn't let me smoke. I was in for three days and when I got out I had an urge for a smoke. I didn't take it because I decided that 50 years of smoking was pushing my luck a bit.
I haven't had a cigarette since, it will be 2 years in August and I don't want a cigarette any more. I tried to quit several times in that 50 year period and don't know why it clicked this time but it did.
My advice to those who want to quit is to not let past failures stop you from trying. Who knows, maybe this time, it will "click" for you. My advice for government is to stay out of people's lives and the personal decisions they make about what they want to do.
That said though, as far as the government taxing tobacco - they don't give a rats ass about anybody's health, it's all about the money and power over others.
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