You know, the money that was said to be so vital to fund “tobacco control” programs. What percentage of the state of Massachusetts’s haul (more than $250 million a year from legal settlement proceeds, aside from outright taxes) do you think actually gets spent on such things? Guess, then click through to my new Cato post.
3 Comments
The tobacco settlement was a great scam on the smoking public perpetrated by the state governments and the tobacco companies. According to R.J. Reynolds “The government per-pack profit from cigarettes in 2011 was $3.68 (or 66 percent of the cost of a pack of cigarettes); more than ten times the profit of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company”. It doesn’t take an Einstein to see who has the greatest incentive to see that people still smoke. It is not just that the states need the money for other purposes that they have almost completely stopped funding programs to help people quit smoking. Once the state governments are hooked on the profits from the sale of tobacco there is no way that they would want people to quit smoking. They can’t afford to lose all of those tax revenues.
Who is the most addicted? Politicians to money or smokers to nicotine?
1%? I would have guessed zero.