How Long Before Smoking Is Made Illegal?

skippi90 said:
What? lol

They make a mahoooosive amount purely from the tax on cigarettes. To make them illegal, they would lose out on this and most likely make up for it by increasing taxes elsewhere.
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But you are assuming that the money that would be spent on cigarettes, and thus the tax revenue generated, simply disappears - it doesn't! It will be spent on other goods and services that also generate tax revenue from their production, distribution and sale. Probably not as much revenue as cigarettes, but then those goods and services will probably not generate increased healthcare costs and reduce the extent of people's productivity quite like cigarettes do!
 
PMKeates said:
But you are assuming that the money that would be spent on cigarettes, and thus the tax revenue generated, simply disappears - it doesn't! It will be spent on other goods and services that also generate tax revenue from their production, distribution and sale. Probably not as much revenue as cigarettes, but then those goods and services will probably not generate increased healthcare costs and reduce the extent of people's productivity quite like cigarettes do!
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So what you are saying is if the government abolished income tax tomorrow they would still get he same amount of tax revenue?
 
Tefal said:
So what you are saying is if the government abolished income tax tomorrow they would still get he same amount of tax revenue?
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No, what I'm saying is that if they did ban smoking, it wouldn't cost anywhere near £9 Bn or £6 Bn or probably even £3 Bn. The idea that the government doesn't ban smoking because it generates tax revenue is simply absurd. I think, however, that you're trying to say that a tax on a product that you have a realistically limited consumption of, that takes people out of work or reduces their productivity and consumes money that would be spent on goods and services that would generate only slightly less revenue, is the same as a graduated tax based on all income. It isn't.
 
PMKeates said:
But you are assuming that the money that would be spent on cigarettes, and thus the tax revenue generated, simply disappears - it doesn't! It will be spent on other goods and services that also generate tax revenue from their production, distribution and sale. Probably not as much revenue as cigarettes, but then those goods and services will probably not generate increased healthcare costs and reduce the extent of people's productivity quite like cigarettes do!
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Are you aware of how much duty is actually on a packet of cigarettes? It is about £2.30 plus 25% of the retail price. What exactly is the money going to be spent on to make up this amount of tax? Petrol?
 
The genie is well and truely out of the bottle with regards to smoking and it will never be stopped. And its doubtful that more fashionable class A's will be legalised as I doubt that the Tobacco and Brewers want the competition
 
Jokester said:
I doubt it'll ever be banned in my lifetime, too much tax pounds to the government to be honest. If it does get banned it'll be for something daft like the CO2 they emit rather than any health effects on the individual users.
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The tax implications aren't huge - cigarettes come from people's disposable income if some chav can't smoke any more he/she isn't about to stick it in the bank for a rainy day - they will probably just spend it on alcohol or generally getting fat. Increase duty on junk food, ready meals etc.. and you'll compensate for the loss in revenue.

If they are going to ban it I reckon the only sensible way would be to gradually raise the age limit and keep on increasing increase duty... (obviously this will create a blackmarket temporarily but the long term implications are that tobacco companies will have to significantly downsize their operations) - you can't just outright ban it as there are muppets out there who thought it was cool as a kid and are now addicted. but constantly increasing the age limit from from 18->19->20 etc.. each year will leave new generations who have never been legally allowed to smoke.

Few years down the line and you'll have a minority of middle aged people who are legally allowed to smoke, though can't get their cigarettes at the local corner shop any more as there is less demand for them and they have to pay say the equivalent of £20 a pack due to the increase in duty.
 
King85 said:
I'd rather see alcohol banned personally, I'd like to see how we could handle socialising with out the need to be drunk and act like an idiot.
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I'd rather see you banned to be honest.

What's wrong with having a nice cool beer?

I much prefer sitting here drinking a nice cool desperado than a boring pint of wasser :p
 
Tefal said:
So you'd be happy to pay more tax to make u pthe loss?
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Obviously not. It doesn't take too much thought to understand the theory behind the post. People on this forum are so literal, using semantics to twist discussions.

Of course, what I was alluding to in my disguised entangling of statements was that I'd prefer, in an ideal world, the government hadn't exploited the clearly life destroying, addictive cancer sticks for easy money at the cost of the lives of the very people they're supposedly taxing to support. (For more info, read: "Unfortunately the government makes a metric arse-tonne of revenue". By using "unfortunately", ive expressed my regret over that fact. Regret insinuates i'd rather it wasn't the case).

From now on all my posts will be bullet pointed for easy reading.
 
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Surely some mad scientist can come up with a GM variant of tobacco plant that is poisonous, or just doesn't contain nicotine, or something?
Grow it in a field in Virginia or somewhere and leave it to cross pollinate the real tobacco plants...

I wonder if our drugs problems could be helped by something like that in the poppy fields, by the way.
 
DampCat said:
Obviously not. It doesn't take too much thought to understand the theory behind the post. People on this forum are so literal, using semantics to twist discussions.

Of course, what I was alluding to in my disguised entangling of statements was that I'd prefer, in an ideal world, the government hadn't exploited the clearly life destroying, addictive cancer sticks for easy money at the cost of the lives of the very people they're supposedly taxing to support. (For more info, read: "Unfortunately the government makes a metric arse-tonne of revenue". By using "unfortunately", ive expressed my regret over that fact. Regret insinuates i'd rather it wasn't the case).

From now on all my posts will be bullet pointed for easy reading.
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saying "I'd like it to happen tomorrow"

Is considerably different to "I wish it never happened in the first place"


So now you're saying that since it has happened you don't want it banned?:confused:

Or you do want it banned but only in an idyllic setting where there is no tax deficit to make up?
 
I forget this is GD. A place where absolutely nobody ever reads anything that anyone posts, and where people are more interested in simply running in, shouting whatever they think, and legging it back out the door.
 
Tefal said:
where as you made a well thought out post with references and backed up information.

Wait no...
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What I've said is based on very simple concepts that I didn't think would need explaining or supporting evidence. For you to quote the cost of illegalising tobacco as tobacco tax income - cost to NHS is almost laughable.

Would you like me to include links to dictionary.com for every word I post?
 
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