>>Who in the heck would pay more in tax than for the product????
Smokers. Cigarettes could be sold US tax exempt for something like $0.50 per pack, the rest is tax.
Back in 2000 Bloomberg raised the cig tax. They went up if I remember correctly a dollar or more a pack. My wife and I smoked 2 pks a day at the time. We put the cigs back and never smoked again. They said oh the reason was my health bs it was for additional revenue which they lost from us