Tobacco tax rise = smuggling increase
- Written by Jonathan de la Cruz
- Monday, 06 August 2012
More than five years ago, 27 states in the US decided to raise taxes on tobacco in a move to pump revenue into their cash strapped treasuries. The state officials had the shock of their lives. Not only did the cash increases hardly materialize, a fresh scourge cropped up before their very eyes. Michigan’s Mackinac Center for Public Policy which closely tracks tobacco tax rates across the United States noted that the increases “inspired an increasingly dangerous cigarette industry where big profits lured criminal gangs and drug traffickers into the booming markets.” The Center noted that smuggling is an “unintended consequence of high cigarette taxes.” .... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/index.php/commentary/item/2494-tobacco-tax-rise-=-smuggling-increase
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