Cigarette Tax Increased to Keep State Running

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/22/nyregion/22budget.html?ref=nyregion">New York Times

ALBANY — New Yorkers who like to smoke will have to dig a little deeper to light up next month, after the Legislature passed a bill on Monday that will give the state the highest cigarette taxes in the country.

The new law, part of an emergency budget measure to keep the government running, adds another $1.60 in state taxes to every cigarette pack sold starting on July 1, pushing the average price of a pack to about $9.20.

The average price in New York City, which imposes its own cigarette taxes, will be even higher, nearly $11 a pack.

Snip...

And in what may be the legislation’s most controversial provisions, starting on Sept. 1, the state will begin collecting — or try to collect — taxes on cigarettes sold on Indian reservations to off-reservation visitors, an issue that led to violent protests during the early 1990s.

Excerpted...
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/22/nyregion/22budget.html?ref=nyregion">Rest of story here.

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I'm not a smoker myself, nor a NY resident anymore, but the taxes in that state are getting out of hand.
And the fact that they think they can solve their budget problems by punishing smokers isn't going to make them any friends, that's for sure.

And I'd really like to know how they plan on collecting tax revenues from tobacco sold on reservation land to non-reservation residents.

I would raise the income and luxury car taxes first.

my cigs are a luxury and I would rather pay more taxes on them than allow pay cuts to service personel or cuts to the school lunch programs, or more taxes on needed items etc...

Florida DOUBLED their taxes. I suppose they will again this time also. Right now there is only a difference of about $1 a pack. Of course, I am speaking of NY outside of NYC.

If NYS needs this money so bad, imagine how badly Florida needs it now due to losing population, tourists, and the Oil Spill. Maybe they will triple them to be even more than NY this time.

to avoid the taxes:(

but get them in New Jersey or have them shipped from another state.

On July 10, 1996, the NYS National Guard commanders circulated plans for an unprecedented military invasion of three traditional Iroquois communities -- Akwesasne, Cattaragus, and Onondage. The plan was code-named "Gallant Piper."

Governor Pataki's press secretary, Roberty Bellafore, told reporters that the plan originated with the Cuomo administration in 1991.

(The sources I have in front of me, after reading your OP, include the Syracuse Post-Standard (11-7-95); the Binghamton Press & Sun-Bulletin (11-5-95); and AHSKWA (Vol 14; 1995), a Native American newspaper.

"What does it sound like to you?" Onondaga Chief Irving Powless, Jr., asked one reporter from Syracuse. "It would be like a military strike. You cancel out all treaties, all negotiations, and you attack a people with two cigarette stores."

That's really how.

Every time they increase the taxes, something like 10% more smokers quit. Eventually the law of diminishing returns is going to enter the picture.

Washington State raised cigarette taxes, lost revenue, so they raised them again.

A lot of people out there rolling their own.

It took me years to go from a venti and a refill per day to one small. Raising prices helped.

tobacco addiction.

:think: Maybe that's why there is so much violence today. People have had to quit smoking because they can't afford them and they also can't afford a treatment plan because their insurance won't cover it, which makes them slowly go insane!

This is great news for New Hampshire
We'll see even more people making the four-hour drive to buy cheap smokes and alcohol.

Many of them make it a nice overnight vacation and save enough to more than cover the cost by filling the van or SUV.

Local paper ran a great piece a few years back when NY raised taxes the last time.

The people with the means and desire will dodge the tax increase, the folks without will shoulder the burden.

Seem to me to be the last group you'd want to target.

and should be stopped.

That and just thinking you can open a fucking casino or start another lotto.

The author's guild had a case where colleges were copying books for class work so students could avoid having to purchase books. The SC said one sector couldn't be made to subsidize the greater society. NYS isn't making any bones about the fact that the taxes are for the purpose of keeping the state running.