71–80 of 151 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The high cigarette tax works in Australia. Smuggling across the border is a bit difficult being an island and guns are relatively rare.
It's all a matter of how high the taxes are. The higher they are, the more profit there is in smuggling.
I have an intense personal dislike of smoking. If more people are really moving off them, all the better. From the intrusion on others (second hand smoke) to the cancer, to the litter, there is absolutely nothing positive about cigarettes. I'm no fan of vaping, but as an intermediate step to the elimination of smoking, it is a necessary evil. I would be very happy if cigarettes vanished from the world.
> there is absolutely nothing positive about cigarettes. This is a silly statement. People smoke for many legitimate reasons beyond having an active addiction.
When you have to choose between food on the table and cigarettes in the pocket... I guess it's easy to quit smoking...
The only measure that has ever been shown to work to reduce smoking is to make smoking less affordable. Tax cigarettes and people smoke less. Tax them highly and kids sure can't afford them. It's more politically easy to put money into paying celebrities to beg kids not to smoke, but it's not actually effective. It's just theater so politicians can say they tried. Here, Greece is seeing the affordability fall just be…
Many countries now have rules where the packets of cigarette show people suffering serious health concerns. This is also said to work well. I'm also sure no smoking indoors or on public streets laws works to reduce smoking well too.
I have an intense personal dislike of smoking. If more people are really moving off them, all the better. From the intrusion on others (second hand smoke) to the cancer, to the litter, there is absolutely nothing positive about cigarettes. I'm no fan of vaping, but as an intermediate step to the elimination of smoking, it is a necessary evil. I would be very happy if cigarettes vanished from the world.
> there is absolutely nothing positive about cigarettes. This is a silly statement. People smoke for many legitimate reasons beyond having an active addiction.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Indeed. The only solution is subsidized rehabilitation or elimination of tobacco (the latter I intend to kickstart, to fund the use of CRISPR to gene drive a detrimental gene in tobacco). If we can do it with mosquitoes, no reason we can’t use it against tobacco.
When reading this comment, I am glad prohibitionists didn't have these scientific tools a century ago. Creepy.
I have an intense personal dislike of smoking. If more people are really moving off them, all the better. From the intrusion on others (second hand smoke) to the cancer, to the litter, there is absolutely nothing positive about cigarettes. I'm no fan of vaping, but as an intermediate step to the elimination of smoking, it is a necessary evil. I would be very happy if cigarettes vanished from the world.
> there is absolutely nothing positive about cigarettes. This is a silly statement. People smoke for many legitimate reasons beyond having an active addiction.
The only measure that has ever been shown to work to reduce smoking is to make smoking less affordable. Tax cigarettes and people smoke less. Tax them highly and kids sure can't afford them. It's more politically easy to put money into paying celebrities to beg kids not to smoke, but it's not actually effective. It's just theater so politicians can say they tried. Here, Greece is seeing the affordability fall just be…
Increased taxes don't have effect on people with poor life choices. I have a few colleagues who are way behind paycheck to paycheck, but will always have smokes. They would rather have a pack or 2 and skip meals not being able to afford them (packs costing ~$13 cad).
Another anecdote, I recall that when I was in the military I actually met a guy who would buy cartons on base and sell the packs off base (they were tax free on base). He was in to all sorts of fringe black market style activities like this. He was also a bootlegger. He hawked his shit at swap meets. This guy was active duty, an E5 with what looked to be a healthy start to a career focused on his service. I learned after I had separated that he had been caught up in an investigation and was court martialed.
I also heard from my brother, who was also in the service, that a handful of active duty guys in his own unit in upstate NY would cross in to Canada to buy cartons to smuggle back across the border to sell in the US. This would've been in the late 80s or early 90s.
I guess my point is, if there's a market for this sort of activity then there is safe money in betting that it's happening some how. And it attributes itself well to the notion that people without a whole lot of money are able to engage in what looks like a very expensive habit to many of us.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> there is absolutely nothing positive about cigarettes. This is a silly statement. People smoke for many legitimate reasons beyond having an active addiction.
Like what? I also see nothing positive about cigarettes.
I have an intense personal dislike of smoking. If more people are really moving off them, all the better. From the intrusion on others (second hand smoke) to the cancer, to the litter, there is absolutely nothing positive about cigarettes. I'm no fan of vaping, but as an intermediate step to the elimination of smoking, it is a necessary evil. I would be very happy if cigarettes vanished from the world.
If you ever lived in an apartment with a neighbor who smokes, it turns from intense personal dislike to pure hate. I will never understand how people can smoke in their homes. It literally turns your house into an ashtray.
> I'm no fan of vaping, but as an intermediate step to the elimination of smoking, it is a necessary evil.
Unless it turns out to be more toxic.
The problem I see is that society seems to turning away from cigarettes and more towards weed and other type of obnoxious drug use.