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Experts hope cigarette taxes will help curb smoking
Staff Writer Smoke 'em if you can afford 'em.
On April 1, the largest federal cigarette tax in history went into effect.
The federal tax increase was more than 60 cents, going from 39 cents to $1.01. When combined with the state tax of $1.504, Minnesotans are paying $2.51 in total tax on a pack of cigarettes.
The end result in Minnesota is a pack of most brands of cigarettes now costs more than $5 - in some cases more than $6 - and the cost of a carton of cigarettes averages close to $50.
The tax is part of the federal initiative Healthy People 2010 set up to achieve national health objectives. However, not enough time has passed since the tax went into effect to determine if it will result in decreased tobacco use, local and state health officials said.
Claudia Fercello, of the Minnesota Department of Health's Tobacco Prevention and Control Office, is hopeful it will have an effect.
"The (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) has said before that taxes are one of the highest interventions for quitting, the most likely thing to reduce tobacco use and to get people to quit smoking," Fercello said. "I think the expectation is that this tax will reduce tobacco use."
Cigarette smoking in the U.S. has declined during the past 40 years among all sociodemographic subpopulations of adults; however, the declines during the past decade have been smaller than in previous decades, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In 2007, an estimated 19.8 percent, or 43.4 million, of U.S. adults were cigarette smokers, the CDC reported. Of these, 77.8 percent, or 33.8 million, smoked every day and 22.2 percent, or 9.6 million, smoked some days.
In Minnesota, the 2007 data from the Minnesota Adult Tobacco Survey shows that the number of smokers was 17 percent of the state's population, down from 22.1 percent in 1999 and 19.3 percent in 2003.
While the Crow Wing County Health Department doesn't track smoking statistics locally, Gwen Anderson, nurse manager, is in agreement with Fercello that the new taxes should lead to fewer people smoking.
Anderson said other factors, such as the poor economy, are also helping.
"These things encourage them to quit. They can't afford it," Anderson said. "We've seen a reduction with the last tax, that had an effect, and just with environmental changes going on, too, with less ability to smoke in public places. It's all an educational tool. Even the folks we see coming into our clinic say they don't smoke in the house anymore or they don't smoke in the car anymore. They're learning."
Chad Knudson, owner of Wild Rice Depot on Business Highway 371, said he has not seen fewer people buying cigarettes since April 1. The reason, he said, was the tobacco companies beat the government to the punch and raised their prices in March.
"They were lining their pockets in response to what they projected they would not realize in revenue because of the tax," Knudson said.
"My volume is the same as it was. I haven't seen any drop. A few people have drifted down to buying lesser-priced brands but we haven't got to the threshold where people balk at it."
Because he had already paid the higher price from the tobacco company, Knudson said he had little inventory on hand April 1 to avoid taking a tax hit. However, he said he wasn't worried when the April 1 tax went into effect because he knew it was coming when President Barack Obama was elected.
"Obama made it quite clear he would sign the tax bill when it when got on his desk," Knudson said.
MATT ERICKSON may be reached at matt.erickson@brainerddispatch.com or 855-5857.
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