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06-05-2007, 05:42 PM
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Machiavelli Incarnate
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Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Mid-south
Posts: 12,132
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Next step for cigarettes in TN
I had just put the other cigarette story up a few days ago, well, here is the next step...a very hefty tax, 42 cents worth.
Quote:
Tennessee cigarette taxes will increase
By Richard Locker
The Commercial Appeal
June 4, 2007
NASHVILLE — After a fiercely partisan debate, the House of Representatives approved a 42-cent cigarette tax increase Monday night and sent it to the governor, who will sign it into law.
Tennessee’s tax will jump from 20 cents for a pack of cigarettes to 62 cents effective July 1.
The House vote was 60 to 34. Unlike the Senate’s 17-16 approval last week, several Republicans joined a majority of Democrats in the House in voting in favor of the tax increase.
The tax hike will generate about $230 million a year in new revenue. Most of the money would be earmarked for a $500 million education improvement program that the General Assembly overwhelmingly approved last week. The rest would be funded by increased revenue from existing taxes.
It would also channel about $10 million into the state’s trauma centers, including a share to the Regional Medical Center at Memphis, and $21 million into agricultural grant programs.
The vote finally came after Democrats defeated
a series of Republican amendments that Democratic leaders said were designed to kill the bill. Any House amendment to the bill would have sent it back to the Senate, where two of the Democrats who voted for the bill last week are absent this week.
It is only the third cigarette tax increase in the state’s history. It remained at 13 cents a pack from 1969 through 2002, when it was raised to 20 cents.
The basic argument by Republicans was that the state has a record budget surplus and a tax increase isn’t needed. "If you vote for this tax increase when we’ve got a billion and a half dollar surplus, don’t ever go home and call yourself a conservative," said Rep. Frank Nicely, R-Strawberry Plains.
But Democrats countered that there isn’t enough money without a tax increase to fully fund the education program, a costly anti-crime bill that most lawmakers favor, restoring money that has been diverted from the highway fund, and giving teachers and state employees a 3 percent pay raise.
Several Republicans attempted to add amendments to use some of the tobacco tax proceeds to reduce the sales tax on food. Democrats promised to cut the sales tax on food by a half-cent — to 5.5 percent — on the state budget bill that will be up for debate later this week.
Rep. Mike Turner, D-Nashville, called an attempt to amend onto the bill a one-time $500 payment to veterans in the "War on Terror" "the lowest attempt at political grandstanding I’ve seen. This is low life, this is dirty, this is below the belt. All you’re trying to do is kill this bill," said Turner.
Finally, Republican Caucus Chairman Glen Casada of Franklin moved to end debate, which passed nearly unanimously, and the bill then passed.
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06-05-2007, 07:46 PM
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Political Mastermind
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Join Date: May 2006
Location: Fort Lewis, WA
Posts: 2,302
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Why don't we just stop bullshitting and playing around and do what most liberals want to do anyways, which is to ban the damn things!!
__________________
"A committee is a group of people who individually can do nothing but together can decide that nothing can be done."
Fred Allen
"A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul."
George Bernard Shaw
"Politics is the art of choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable."
John Galbraith
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06-05-2007, 08:24 PM
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Machiavelli Incarnate
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Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: Texas
Posts: 2,687
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Quote:
Originally Posted by gdfather02
Why don't we just stop bullshitting and playing around and do what most liberals want to do anyways, which is to ban the damn things!!
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You didn't learn anything from Prohibition, did you? Ban them and they'll go underground and the price will skyrocket and you'll have the same problem you have with drugs now.......money in the pockets of organized crime, a rise in robberies and burglaries to support habits and an irate populace that sees the government as even more of an enemy! Social engineering and the government in everyone's house and business poking around. Really, really smart......
__________________
Most of the world's crises can be tracked back to the fact that WE HAVE TOO MANY LAWYERS.
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Without women, money would have no meaning......Aristotle Onassis.
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06-05-2007, 08:44 PM
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Machiavelli Incarnate
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Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Mid-south
Posts: 12,132
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SydneySteel
You didn't learn anything from Prohibition, did you? Ban them and they'll go underground and the price will skyrocket and you'll have the same problem you have with drugs now.......money in the pockets of organized crime, a rise in robberies and burglaries to support habits and an irate populace that sees the government as even more of an enemy! Social engineering and the government in everyone's house and business poking around. Really, really smart......
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With prices going this high there will be guys crossing state lines to make the action happen. Essentially they have created a prohibition and cigs will get sold on the black market for less than what you pay at the regular store. I am not sure of the point you are making here. It is like scalping tickets at the ballpark really. |
06-05-2007, 09:05 PM
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Machiavelli Incarnate
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Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: Texas
Posts: 2,687
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cat's meow
With prices going this high there will be guys crossing state lines to make the action happen. Essentially they have created a prohibition and cigs will get sold on the black market for less than what you pay at the regular store. I am not sure of the point you are making here. It is like scalping tickets at the ballpark really.
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As long as they are expensive, but legal, black market cigarettes will be cheaper, but as soon as they are banned, the price will skyrocket. Dealers charge for their risk, you know. Scalping tickets is illegal and look at the prices of scalped tickets and the counterfeiting.
__________________
Most of the world's crises can be tracked back to the fact that WE HAVE TOO MANY LAWYERS.
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Without women, money would have no meaning......Aristotle Onassis.
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06-06-2007, 02:38 PM
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Political Mastermind
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Join Date: May 2006
Location: Fort Lewis, WA
Posts: 2,302
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SydneySteel
You didn't learn anything from Prohibition, did you? Ban them and they'll go underground and the price will skyrocket and you'll have the same problem you have with drugs now.......money in the pockets of organized crime, a rise in robberies and burglaries to support habits and an irate populace that sees the government as even more of an enemy! Social engineering and the government in everyone's house and business poking around. Really, really smart......
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Oh, and the government "claiming to care" about the health of their citizens isn't as bad, no??
Actually, it is quite hypocritical and funny, as they give the appearance of caring, while, at the same time, the government continues to pocket this cash cow!!
You can consider the government a "scalper" of sorts....
__________________
"A committee is a group of people who individually can do nothing but together can decide that nothing can be done."
Fred Allen
"A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul."
George Bernard Shaw
"Politics is the art of choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable."
John Galbraith
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06-06-2007, 02:43 PM
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Machiavelli Incarnate
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Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Mid-south
Posts: 12,132
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Quote:
Originally Posted by gdfather02
Oh, and the government "claiming to care" about the health of their citizens isn't as bad, no??
Actually, it is quite hypocritical and funny, as they give the appearance of caring, while, at the same time, the government continues to pocket this cash cow!!
You can consider the government a "scalper" of sorts....
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In a way I don't dissagree with you (as usual) but I certainly don't want to have the gov pass up a good revenue source. In some of a my most creative of thinking we should legalize drugs, regulate it, and then tax the living sh*t out of it. Many problems are residual so that would not probably work... 
Off topic...yours and my dads guys (tarheels) made it to the CWS, next round, and none of my guys (Tx, Mem) did...
Last edited by cat's meow; 06-06-2007 at 02:46 PM.
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06-06-2007, 02:47 PM
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Machiavelli Incarnate
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Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: mountains of East TN
Posts: 10,787
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cat's meow
With prices going this high there will be guys crossing state lines to make the action happen. Essentially they have created a prohibition and cigs will get sold on the black market for less than what you pay at the regular store. I am not sure of the point you are making here. It is like scalping tickets at the ballpark really.
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Tennessee borders on 8 states. Almost nowhere in Tennessee is more than 100 miles from another state. I don't smoke but my brother in law does. We live 11 miles from the North Carolina border. What is TN going to do, put a customs station up at all the borders?
__________________
Its better to have fussed and crabbed then never to have fussed at all - Lucy
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06-06-2007, 02:48 PM
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Machiavelli Incarnate
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Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: mountains of East TN
Posts: 10,787
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Quote:
Originally Posted by gdfather02
Oh, and the government "claiming to care" about the health of their citizens isn't as bad, no??
Actually, it is quite hypocritical and funny, as they give the appearance of caring, while, at the same time, the government continues to pocket this cash cow!!
You can consider the government a "scalper" of sorts....
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The government does not want to out law cigarettes, they make far too much money off the taxes to do that. They even subsidize some tobacco growers now
__________________
Its better to have fussed and crabbed then never to have fussed at all - Lucy
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06-06-2007, 02:50 PM
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Machiavelli Incarnate
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Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: mountains of East TN
Posts: 10,787
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We ought to legalize prostitution as well. Then the slogan could be "Its a business to do pleasure with you"
__________________
Its better to have fussed and crabbed then never to have fussed at all - Lucy
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