Maine to hike taxes, New Hampshire to ban smoking?

[Jimmie the Mum]

An article from: CigarCyclopedia.com

New England readies new pressure on tobacco:
Maine is considering a new hike in tobacco taxes, which may well benefit stores in neighboring New Hampshire where tobacco taxes are lower.

In the meantime, a smoking ban has been proposed in New Hampshire, being fought vigorously on civil liberties as well as business grounds by local businesses, including more than two dozen tobacconists.

Maine Governor John Baldacci, a Democrat, has proposed increasing the cigarette tax from $2 per pack to $3 per pack, in order to raise an additional $66 million a year. At the same time, taxes on other tobacco products would be raised by 50%: smokeless tobacco taxes would be raised from 78% to 117% of the wholesale price and cigar taxes would rise from 20% of the wholesale price to 30%.

The impact is predictable, as noted by J. Scott Moody, author of a report on the impact of tax increases in small states that was released in March. “The data clearly show that as tobacco taxes increase, so does the amount of cross-border shopping to avoid the tax increases.” This may not work so well in large states like California, but in New England, the distances aren’t great. And the New Hampshire tax of 80 cents a pack is already well below the current Maine ($2), Massachusetts ($1.51) and Vermont ($1.19) per-pack rates. So much for raising a lot of new revenue, Gov. Baldacci.

In New Hampshire, however, retail tobacconists – while exempt from the smoking ban – are extremely worried about the impact of such a ban on their businesses. “I have a problem being the exception,” said Two Guys Smoke Shop owner David Garofalo in an interview with the New Hampshire Union Leader. “The bill is worse than it looks.”

Garofalo and other smokeshop owners are deeply concerned that by eliminating almost everywhere people can other than their shops, business will plummet. “We’re going from someone buying a box of cigars to a single cigar that they’ll smoke here,” said Garofalo.

Victor Vitale of the Cigar Agency in Nashua, N.H. noted that smoking restrictions are “slowly turning into prohibition.

“It’s very much an uphill battle because I believe we’re being looked at as the bad guy. Take the smoking out of it and look at the freedoms and liberty at stake.”

The New Hampshire smoking ban bill passed the State Senate and the opposition is focused on trying to kill it – as was done last year – in the House.