Posted on 09/01/2002 5:46:10 AM PDT by sarcasm
Every so often, customers stroll into Nenex Deli and Grocery in the Wakefield section of the Bronx and ask for a pack of cigarettes. Only when the clerk asks for $7 do they realize their mistake. They've just unwittingly crossed from Mount Vernon in Westchester County to the Bronx, where cigarettes cost $1.50 more per pack. "Customers come in, and when I tell them the price, they say, 'No way, I don't want it,'" said Naser Mozeb, a clerk at Nenex, just two blocks from the Mount Vernon-Bronx border. Nenex isn't alone. Wakefield clerks say the high cost of cigarettes in New York City - between $7 and $7.50 per pack - is driving their customers north to Mount Vernon or west to nearby Yonkers. Business started to decline immediately after the city enacted a $1.50 sales tax on tobacco products six weeks ago, clerks said. "Everybody goes to Mount Vernon," said clerk Obaid Al-Fata at F&A Deli, across from Nenex. "I don't blame them. They save a lot of money." Al-Fata said the store used to make $3,000 a week selling cigarettes and cigars. Now it makes a mere $500 to $700 a week. At Nenex, workers used to order about 50 cartons a week. Since the tax hike, they have yet to reorder. The problem is not only the loss of tobacco sales but also the extras smokers buy. "They buy everything here - a beer, a sandwich, a soda," said Mozeb, who estimates the store's total sales are down 25% for the month. No loopholes There is little hope of getting around the tax. The city keeps track of the stores' cigarette sales by checking supplier computer records. Inspectors also randomly visit stores, checking stamps on the bottoms of packs to ensure they are state-purchased and state-approved. Around Wakefield, smokers admit they stock up when they leave the Bronx. "My wife works in Yonkers, and she buys for me and her because it's much cheaper," said Randy Leckey, 45, a smoker for 25 years. "Prices here are ridiculous." Jose Martinez, 26, drives up the street to an Amoco service station in Mount Vernon, where he pays $5.50 a pack. The trip saves him about $10 a week on his pack-a-day Newport habit. "If I really need it, I'll buy it here," Martinez said. "But usually, I'll go to the gas station." Meanwhile, Westchester is reaping the benefits of Wakefield's losses. At Polanco Supermarket in Mount Vernon, a few blocks from White Plains Road in the Bronx, owner Niurka Polanco said cigarette sales are up. "People from the Bronx are buying up here," she said. "And they buy more packs together - four or five at a time." Polanco said the smokers also buy other products, like milk and lottery tickets. Nearby, at Lachmin Grocery on Mount Vernon Avenue, owner Mohan Sahai sympathized with the south-of-the-border businesses. "It does help my store, but I do feel sorry for them in the Bronx," he said. "They still have the same overhead expenses. That doesn't go down." The Bronx store owners try to remain optimistic, hanging on to the hope that Westchester will raise its prices, too. "If cigarettes go up in Westchester, that will be good," said Raf Halshman, a worker at F & A Deli. "We have to wait and be patient." The change better come soon, said Ahmed Mohammed, a clerk at Little Grocery on White Plains Road in the Bronx. With its cigarette sales down 75% this month, the store is struggling. "We're just a candy store," Mohammed said. "Instead of making a profit, now we're just making a living."
Social engineering using taxation. Bloomy has one term to socialize as much of NYC as possible before the voters toss him on his arse. So "smoke 'em if ya got 'em" is being changed to "smoke 'em if you can afford 'em". And it doesn't seem like he's worried about losing a few thousand small business to the burbs. He'll be out of office long before the tax money runs out.
Big Tobacco sold us out. And the liquor industry has so many ads on TV and with the YOUTH no less.
Also, you hear the anti-smokers yelling that Big Tobacco is still advertising to our youth! WHERE? And in magazines, it takes TWO! It's the EDITOR who is taking Big T's money and putting the ads in the magazines. Big T isn't holding a GUN to his head! But yet, the anti's are blaming Big T............
The next step was the no smoking areas in restaurants. This should have been fought, but again, they gave in.
The restaurant owners thought it couldn't happen to them. Well....it DID happen. Now we see more restaurant and bar owners standing up and fighting this. It should be up to them, NOT big GOVERNMENT!
I do not see this battle as a "smoking" issue, but as a freedom issue.
THANK you!
There is many layers to this. Too much to go into here. It's all about power and MONEY.
Jose Martinez, 26, drives up the street to an Amoco service station in Mount Vernon, where he pays $5.50 a pack. The trip saves him about $10 a week on his pack-a-day Newport habit.Jose Martinez is not saving $10 dollars a week. He's spending about $25 dollars a week more than he would if he bought his smokes online.
He'd spend even less if he "stuffed his own" cigarettes.
Wake-up and smell the taxes, Jose. 
"Happy and safe Labor Day week-end everyone!"Same to you and yours, SheLion!
Pity. Just like here in Maine. Governor King, Independent, is leaving in January. Running tail back to VA after he spent "8" years running Maine's budget into the ground.
Well, Bloomingidiot is going to leave the New Yorkers feeling like this:
WAKE UP WAKE UP WAKE UP!!!!!!!!!!
For under $8 dollars.....a beautiful carton of cigarettes!!!!!
Thanks KS HONEY! Same to you!
This is sarcasm of course, but clearly we can see where this will go. New York will have to hire more tobacco police, and there goes the windfall profits anticipated by creating the taxes. Government has become so predictable.
My favorite example--wish I could remember the specifics:
A state government was charging a 50% excise tax on widgets; widget sales were something like $100,000/year, so the tax brought in $50,000. Someone in the legislature pushed through a tax reduction to 10%, over protests that the state couldn't afford it--it would cost $40,000.
Well, after the tax was cut, widget sales soared tenfold, to $1,000,000/year. Tax revenues increased as well, to $100,000. Did that appease the naysayers? Nope.
Instead, they complained that the tax cut was costing the state even more than they'd expected, to the tune of $400,000, and needed to be rolled back up.
It is appalling how much taxes folks pay these days-FICA, State, Sales, SS, and Medicare. I almost cry everytime I get my paycheck-a good 33% is gone and then you get to pay out the bazoo for every thing you purchase (except food)!
I ain't gonna take much longer.
60% tobacco industry, 40% weak-kneed pandering politicians.
Someone beat you to it. But you can join the throngs that are DOING it!!!! :)
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