How Australia is stubbing out smoking
bbc.com
bbc.com
In Europe I find it really hard to watch people _constantly_ throwing cigarette butts down storm water drains, into canals and doing other disgusting things, like stubbing the butts into the sand on the beach or into the soil of a river bank. I find it highly disturbing how un-aware people are about the damage being done to fragile eco-systems.
I remember walking around Rome not long ago just thinking how disgustingly dirty the city was (I love Rome btw), there was little flower gardens just over flowing with butts, butts accumulating in gutters etc.
I actually felt anxiety about it raining just knowing where it was all headed.
So yeah, it would be cool to see this happen in other places around the world.
Then she dropped it on the ground, stomped it and and walked away. It's really hard to be a generous person when others constantly prove cynicism right.
He replied "we'll pick it up for me then" and walked inside.
I did pick it up, entered the laundromat and threw it in to his basket of clean clothes.
Then we got in a fight, it probably wasn't worth it but it felt really good.
I so wish that 7-11, starbucks etc. charged $5 deposit for every drink container they sell, ah one can always dream...
You people scare me. Honestly. I'm not joking. What I can feel anxiety for: thinking that people can start a fight for a butt on the floor.
Making people feel guilt for using the wrong trash container, or leaving the tap open for too long. Life's too short for that crap, IMHO.
It makes me think of Demolition Man. I believed it was over the top comedy when it was released. Now I'm not taking it as a joke anymore.
Edit: I should not need to say this. But... I don't smoke. Also I don't approve people littering if they can avoid it.
Also, the natural environment is not the wrong trash can, it's simply not a trash can at all.
I've often seen people deliberately ignore signs warning people not to use a storm water drain as a trash can. What hope do we have when people do things like that?
Also, I have no idea how we got into water restrictions, but why not?
Our resources are limited. No use squandering them because "yolo".
Let me share an old story of my hometown. Public water supply pipes are a disaster in the area. I saw an official report that showed that the waste was between 20% and 40%. So, even if this is the spanish province with the most rain, we suffered from restrictions most summers. No current water from 10 PM to 10 AM.
Now two infuriating (for me, at least) cases: one nearby village spent a hefty sum repairing the pipes, so no more leaks, and a family here that installed a reservoir in the roof to have water after 10 PM. Please notice that cutting the supply is not intended to make people consume less (they do more since water is kept in buckets for the night), but to reduce the leaks to half (half time pressurized pipes).
The family was fined because they were not "solidary" with their neighbours. The rest of councils of the area made a big noise and demanded the village that had invested in infrastructure, and thus attacked the root problem, to put restrictions in place.
You might think that these stories have nothing to do with the current conversation. Maybe I should have written about the fines for not recycling while there were not recycling facilities, so everything ended in the same dumpster, or the golf fields that sucked tons of water, I don't know.
My point is what I wrote above: beware of this kind of absolute idea when they stomp over people or common sense. Do what you reasonably can to make the world a little better, but don't put the responsability to save the world on your shoulders, that's not healthy.
The train stations were horrible. I once looked under the platform and each time a trains comes it pushes butts to one side. There were literally 10,000s or more.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_cigarette...
In addition is forbidden to smoke in public enclosed spaces (which is not a given in many countries), and it is forbidden to advertise cigarettes and tobacco.
There is in general less stigma associated to smoking than in the US, for this reason people might feel more "free" to openly smoke in places where it is not forbidden.
They're the only part of a rollie that isn't biodegradable - the rest being plant matter (the tobacco) and other plant matter (paper).
The taste is far better without one too, less airflow restriction, and I vaguely recall something about filtered cigs being potentially more dangerous than unfiltered ones - something to do with all the nicotine being 'stolen' by the filter (due to it settling in with the tar-resin stuff that builds up in the filter or whatever), leading people who smoke filtered fags & rollies to actually smoke more to get the "hit" they were looking for, to the point where any benefit the filter provided in the first place is completely nullified and even beyond.
It's also worth noting that Nicorette is much cheaper than in the US. The moment you start using that you save money in Australia.
It's curious that the article doesn't mention e-cigarettes. It's funny how harm minimisation is pushed by academic researchers when it comes to most drugs but isn't discussed that much when it comes to tobacco. They have been pretty much banned in Australia.
It's an easy way to evaluate the real priorities of politicians though. If cost of living issues were really their number one priority then these sin taxes would be the first to go.
I guess it depends on the priorities of your wider society. I think ours is pretty right, personally.
Aside from that there's the general problems you always have with prohibition, people will use other substances on the black market, many of which will be worse.
The argument runs both ways: given smoking is a lifestyle choice with absolutely no positive outcomes for anyone other than tobacco companies, and numerous and virtually guaranteed bad health outcomes for those who smoke and almost certainly for those frequently around the smoker, then I don't see why wider society should be "punished" for the avoidable actions of those who choose not to quit smoking.
It's not like there are not extensive campaigns and programs subsidised by the Australian government for those willing to attempt quitting cigarettes.
When looking up the phrase "my rights end where yours begin", I came across the much more colorful "Your liberty to swing your fist ends just where my nose begins". I don't think the freedom to emit noisome or noxious fumes is quite as unlimited as implied by your comment.
[0]: https://www.laborlawcenter.com/education-center/new-ada-guid...
[1]: http://www.foxnews.com/food-drink/2015/07/27/florida-county-... (includes autoplay video, sorry)
If your exhaust pipe was pointed at my face on the sidewalk again I'd complain.
A lot of offices have gone to perfume/cologne free because it is offensive to a lot of people.
Of course you still have to smell the person who just finished a smoke outside which is far worse than even the most liberal applier of perfume.
It would be real nice if they would refrain from optimizing the lives of everyone around them for not living longer as well.
There are people - there is a problem, there are no people - no problem
I like the idea.
Do they hand out or heavily encourage ecigs? Are those cheap in general and permitted to be used everywhere on public property?
Because if so I accept your agreement, because it is clearly not about punishing people for enjoying something, but if not, then I assume the people who run it are just another bunch of statists out to kill as much fun as they can.
Yes.
Are you sure about that?
Smoking tobacco is recognised as one of the largest preventable causes of death and disease in Australia. Each year, smoking kills an estimated 15,000 Australians and costs Australia $31.5 billion in social (including health) and economic costs. The Australian Government and state and territory governments, through the Council of Australian Governments, have committed by 2018, to reduce the national adult daily smoking rate to 10% and halve the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adult daily smoking rate (from 47% in 2008).
According to a systematic review of studies of tobacco elasticities the average price elasticity for teenagers was -1.43 and -0.76 for young adults. As such, a 10% increase in tobacco price could be expected to decrease the tobacco consumption of teenagers by around 14%, and that of young adults by around 7.6%.
[1] http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/914041468176678949...
[2] http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/hec.765/abstract
Or just listen to smokers complaining how they're a dying breed (works on two levels, that one), or how you can't just ask anyone for a light anymore as fewer people carry lighters, and how bumming a cigarette off a stranger is no longer commonplace now that cigs are over a buck each.
It really kills me that there seems to be a lot of lazy thinking around this subject. It has for a number of years, in fact. I hope this isn't taken as an 'appeal to authority' argument, but I'm an economist who has worked in tax policy for a number of years, during which time I actually advised a couple of Australian Prime Ministers and their Cabinets on excise tax. I'm not trying to be a contrarian here. If people know what is and is not effective, then they are in a better position to pressure their elected representatives to take effective measures to combat smoking.
Doing this makes you feel like an outsider to your own friendship group. I know the clubs complained bitterly that it lowered their revenue.
I would think that smokers (rightfully) feel like a shunned minority when they are told to smoke in alleys far away from the general population.
They have to make a special effort to go somewhere to smoke because they can no longer light up at a restaurant or while they're doing errands.
It's hard to pretend you're "cool" when you're standing by yourself and society doesn't want you anywhere near them.
So there's no coolness and no convenience.
As far as I am concerned, a cigarette tax should stand until proven harmful, not only if proven beneficial.
I believe that taxes paid by smokers help to subsidise the healthcare of non-smokers, not the other way around. Or put it this way - if all Australians stopped smoking then either everyone's taxes would have to go up to cover the shortfall or the quality of the healthcare would be lower.
Tobacco excise raises about $2B a year(1), but smoking costs around $30B a year(2). A 10% increase in the excise reduces the smoking rate around 4%, so simplistic analysis indicates that around $200M raised would save nearly $1.5B (lots of simplification and assumptions there obviously).
(1) http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departm...
$30B, with just over 3M smokers in Australia is $10,000 per smoker per year. I call bullshit.
Even in NZ the health department were only claiming a cost of $1.9B per year and that was controversial. An anti-smoking group's report in NZ only managed to stretch it as far as $350M per year.
Edit:
Ok, I found the paper where they came up with the $30B figure.
"The average intangible value of the loss of one year’s living in 2004/05 prices was calculated to be $53,267."
That is where the number comes from. Like I said, hyperbole.
Also, some napkin calculations: $2b / 3m smokers = $666 / year. $666 / 52 = $13. The average smoker is paying a lot more than that in tax each week (a single pack is $20 - $30).
The quoted $2B tax revenue is bunkum too. NZ was taking in $1B seven years ago with a population 1/5 of Australia's and with prices 1/2 what they are now.
Here are figures from the latest Commonwealth budget, and the latest inter-generational report: http://imgur.com/a/UWFAa
Tobacco excise takes in $9.4bn in revenue per year, and is expected to hit north of $10.5bn over the next four years, due to the recent excise hike. This will make tobacco the largest 'earner' when it comes to excise and customs duty (even beating diesel and petrol).
The IG report contends (as it has for many years now) that when people hit about age 62, their individual tax / revenue curves cross-over. By 70, they are receiving public expenditure 2.5 times greater than the tax they pay. By 75 it's about 3 times. By 80, it's about 4.5. And before anyone plays the "you're a monster" card, I also think it's good that people are living longer and not dying from smoking related illness.
But I would suggest that public finance is not the strongest grounds to argue anti-smoking on. The fact that it kills so many people, in pretty awful ways, is more than enough justification for us to try and hasten tobacco's demise. Please think carefully about the issue, because you'll be better able to pressure our politicians to take more effective action (and also make it impossible for them to quietly go backwards).
But in terms of raw dollars it's different. If smokers die 10 years earlier, that's 10 years less of unproductive period in life, retirement.
No pensions, no medical costs, no living expenses. They pay and save for retirement, but don't use it.
Since we're throwing around random opinions...
Would you say that the kind of person that continues such an expensive habit nowadays despite what everyone knows about smoking is the kind of person who "pays and saves for retirement"?
Poorer, less-educated people are much more likely to smoke. How about we also take this into account when we're speculating about how much they might be saving.
Worse, it uses up the free hospital beds and there is a waitlist.
And your argument is particularly silly - do you think people die of cancer overnight? No, they hang in there for years, and as a compassionate society we treat them for their terrible disease until they die. Of course, there are many other things that smoking can do before someone contracts a fatal condition: gangrenous limbs that must be amputated, rooting teeth and gums that must be operated on, non-fatal strokes that prevent them from working and must be subsidised, cataracts and blindness, hip and bone fractures, diabetes and increased recovery times from surgery all contribute to the cost.
And we have an additional cost that's not obvious to those outside Australia: bushfires. In fact, it's estimated that a quarter of all deaths in fires were due to cigarettes being improperly disposed. I believe the cost is something like $150 million a year. And that's not even putting a cost on the deaths of these people to their families and friends.
> being able to leave children with their grandparents for care.
Don't recall that being addressed though, but it's almost certainly less than pension.
I do agree that killing people as soon as they retire is the economic thing to do. Unsure that will win many elections, but who knows....
Instead of trying to find ways to make people retire later and work more, let's find ways to make people not need to work as much.
Also aged people put money into the economy in various ways so it's not a lost cause.
Aged people are also great baby sitters. You know day cares are insanely expensive. Grandparents are a lot cheaper.
Plus let's not kill people to save money. Many chose to euthanize themselves once they become bed ridden.
I know I would rather die than live a life where my memory is not functional. If I am bed ridden, I would happily say good bye to my family and call it a good life.
"The poor" need to reevaluate their priorities if smoking is their choice for spending their limited resources. How else should activities that are bad for society be discouraged?
It's interesting that the rich are much more likely to choose not to smoke even though they are the ones who can actually afford it. I'm not sure what that means but it's interesting to me.
Smoking rates go down by level of education but is that cause or correlation?
What makes poor people want to smoke more than rich?
> If cost of living issues were really their number one priority then these sin taxes would be the first to go.
Not sure about this. Cost of living IMO is about affordable housing, food and transport. You know, the actual essentials, not non-essential "luxuries" such as poisonous addictions.
[1] It's a theory I don't agree with – I think they're as responsible as us and taxes on cigarettes still deter them from smoking.
However, I think its more about providing a strong deterrent for potential new smokers.
Which again, might not be so terrible given how little is understood about the drug. It can certainly be life-destroying if you smoke to get it.
And yet nicotine patches are widely and cheaply available and unstigmatized.
I'd guess that it's more due to the fact that e-cigs look like normal cigarettes.
And many of us who are anti-smoking (and anti-vaping), are also supporters of public transportation and reducing car usage.
We could, of course, assume that there might be ill effects even thogh we can't even imagine what those would be at this point, however we could do that with practically anything, couldn't we?
Vaping is primarily a nuisance to those that (correctly) learned to consider smoke (but also, unfortunately, whatever looks like smoke) as something negative, due to decades of anti-smoking campaigns. It looks like smoke so it's bound to be bad.
Anti-smoking campaigns and legislation exist not because smoking is a nuisance, but because it causes real health issues.
Perfume is not really regulated by legislation in public spaces (unless there is some edge-case that I'm missing), obviously it can be regulated internally, as part of a private work policy for example -the same way that dressing code does. Totally different matter.
Barbeque smoke, like any smoke, is harmful, so I don't think we should compare it either.
If vaping becomes a disturbance to the extent that it needs to be regulated, any regulating should be done completely independently of any superficial similarities to smoking, based solely on facts relevant to the actual disturbance.
The fact that most arguments I see are based on the possibility of unknown health effects -even though there is no evidence for such- and not on the fact that it is otherwise disturbing, to me indicates that it's no more disturbing than dozens of other things that are allowed in public places but nobody dares propose that they should be banned by law.
As a society we've worked hard to ensure you can live your life without inhaling cigarette smoke; I don't see any reason to avoid extending this to e-cigarettes.
Of course, I've also seen clauses forbidding e-cigs inside apartment buildings. That's just an irrational, dick move—they aren't a fire hazard and don't appear to cause property damage like smoke does.
Unfortunately, I can't say I disagree with you. There's an entire culture around "big clouds", which are extremely obnoxious in public.
My intuition is on your side though, I imagine they are far less damaging than normal cigarettes.
Of course they have. There has been solid evidence of the harm of tobacco cigarettes for decades. Smoking bans are well supported by the evidence. Any restrictions on e-cigarettes is not.
In this case, we are erring on the side of caution and banning e-cigs until they are further studied. Learning from our mistakes.
Also, they aren't banned. The FDA just made it so small businesses wouldn't be able to make the ecig products (basically). Big tabacco, however, is able to take the hit. Take it how you will.
Keep in mind this article is about Australia too. We have a much tighter and more strict food and consumables regulatory body which has typically served us well. It wouldn't make sense for us to strongly fight against cigarettes and then just let some new inhaled product on the market without studies showing they're okay.
Another part of the regulation impetus was that they were uncertified electronic devices which no matter the purpose is fairly tightly regulated as well.
It has not been demonstrated they are completely safe either. Some countries take your approach, others a more conservative one.
This holds for any substance in existence. Yes, that's fairly pedantic, but I think it demonstrates the lack of any argument for banning it based on solid health research.
That doesn't mean a more conservative approach shouldn't be taken when new products enter the market for user consumption.
Nicotine itself does have problems. It is, after all, a pesticide.
Assuming that e-cigarettes result in a lowered level of cigarette smoking, banning e-cigarettes sounds a lot like perfect being the enemy of good.
Step 1. Open a pokies room with a slated wall
Step 2. Let people smoke in it and call it "outside"
WA gets pinged by NSW and Victoria whenever GST distribution comes up for not having pokies as an alternative tax source.
I hope WA continues to resist the temptation to allow them here.
Being a very occasional social smoker who should probably quit anyway it hasn't bothered me, but I did find it just a bit ludicrous when I tried to buy a pack at Safeway. The exchange went something like this:
me: Give me a pack of Peter Stuyvesants, ah, um, I think the light ones in the blue colored pack.
staff: They don't have colors anymore. We can't show you the packet. You have to tell us which ones.
me: Really? Ok, fine. Well, just give me the 8mg low tar ones, whatever they're called.
staff: They don't have mg measures on the packets any more.
me: So how do I know which ones are the light ones?
staff: You just have to know.
At some point in your life, a tobacco company has marketed something at your in such a way that they've conveyed a mistruth; they lied to you. Shocking, I know.
"Light" cigarettes are not better for you. There is no "harm minimisation".
Tar and nicotine are a "measured" by percentage of puff multiplied by the expected number of puffs in the burn duration. Cigarettes are "lightened" by adding perforations in the filter tip so the smoker inhales air at the same time. This lowers the concentrations of smoke, lowering the measurements above.
The industry standards for "light" and "ultralight" are just boundaries around tar measurements.
The problem is the "burn duration" used to calculate all this is normalised at a static rate and not at real flow. It's basically a made up length of time based on the observation of lighting a cigarette and letting it burn down. There's less airflow through the tobacco in a light cigarette, so it burns a lot slower. Its smoker gets more drags.
The amount of tobacco and nicotine and tar is the same. The amount delivered isn't as appreciably different as a smoker might like.
This is reflected in countless outcome studies. Just as many people die from smoking light cigarettes.
If light cigarettes have any amount less tar, then that's still an improvement.
Anecdotally, I smoked for 8 years and used ultra light cigarettes (1-3mg) as a tool to cut down and eventually quit.
Conversely, I dicked around with various NRTs, various actual doses but nicotine cravings and the fear of even worse cravings kept me returning to cigarettes. To quit, I had to go cold turkey. It was the psychological and physical finality that let me let go.
For me the finality was important. I'd read a fair amount about breaking addiction and people describing it as the most traumatic thing in their life and that's a narrative that's very commonplace in quitting services, NRT products. It makes quitting a very scary prospect. Moreso to an anxious, risk averse guy in his late 20s. In reality, even cold turkey is only horrible for a short amount of time. A couple of weeks... Which is nothing for the lifetime and quality of life you regain.
I reflected on fear-of-quitting a month after my last cigarette. https://thepcspy.com/read/breaking-the-habit/
Anyway, my point above is that in terms of actual damage done, a cigarette is a cigarette. There may be slight variances and you can trick yourself into thinking different things, but physiologically, the same stuff happens.
But people smoking these cigarettes block the holes with their fingers or their mouths, and so they draw air through the cigarette but not through the perforations.
But they've not yet moved to black/white boxes and I imagine you can still see the boxes if you ask.
Smoking just isn't popular in Australia among my age group (late 20's), where it is still way more common in Germany.
Young people just don't seem interested in Australia outside of having a smoke with a beer at a party, it's very much perceived as something poorer people do, and is not considered classy at all.
So yeah, compared with other countries that I've visited, smoking is seen quite differently here and seems like its well on the way out. It'll be interesting to see if it rebounds in future generations though.
Amongst friends my age, mid to late 20s, most of those who smoke have to do so separated from the group outside as well, as you are not allowed to smoke indoors. So people simply don't. There are enough barriers to make social smoking less prevelant and then if you are by yourself it is harder to justify the health cost and monetary cost.
To smoke a pack a day here you would have to spend $300 a fortnight.
Yes, huge difference.
But alcohol also has a huge difference in price, but that doesn't stop Australians from drinking a ton. (Though its not as a big a difference as smoking).
What I don't understand is -- why isn't a similar education, advertising, and taxation effort being made with alcohol? The negative externalities associated with alcohol are mind-boggling[2].
[1] http://www.vox.com/a/teens [2] http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/201...
Although, it is much more tricky to estimate the harm caused by alcohol consumption and then levy taxes accordingly. The reason being that unlike smoking, which has very high rates of addiction, the vast majority of people who consume alcohol don't really come to any harm because of it. But 10-15 % of consumers are super badly harmed by it, mostly due to a genetic predisposition to alcoholism. It's similar to gambling in many ways.
Ideally you'd have a tax rate that increases with each additional 'unit' of alcohol purchased within some time period. Obviously this is totally impractical to implement. But before all that there's a pretty basic 'first-step' we should be taking: levying tax on alcohol on a volumetric basis, rather than having different rates for beer, wine, spirits etc. It's the best starting point: simply levy a tax of x cents per milli-litre of alcohol. Only after we've done that can we start getting all fancy with measures like 'pre-commitment', time-varying tax rates (which I personally think are unfeasible) etc.
EDIT: As for negative externalities, putting aside public health, my guess is the two main sources would be (a) drunk, anti-social behaviour and (b) third-party road injuries and fatalities. As to the magnitude of these, I have no idea...
This attribute basically makes it very difficult for people to adopt a "well it's their choice, I'll let them dig their own grave" attitude in regard to smoking.
>Most of the research has come from studies of nonsmokers who are married to a smoker. Those conclusions are also backed up by further studies of workplace exposure to smoke
I suggest you don't marry a smoker, or work in a bar where they allow smoking. Otherwise, you'll be fine. You'll probably be fine either way. The increased risk is minimal (1-4%?) and requires years and years of constant exposure.
At this point some smokers like to bring up "b-b-but what if someone wears a ton of perfume??" but in practice basically nobody regularly takes a break to shoot perfume several times in a row into the air around them.
That also applies to different cultures' bathing and perfume practises, but I think we all recognise that banning those practises would be unjust.
> At this point some smokers like to bring up "b-b-but what if someone wears a ton of perfume??" but in practice basically nobody regularly takes a break to shoot perfume several times in a row into the air around them.
You've clearly never shared an enclosed space with someone whose bathing practises — while unobjectionable from a health & sanitation viewpoint — are different from your own.
It's quite rare that I come across anyone who's even close to as stinky as a smoker who's currently smoking. Besides, as a practical matter, restricting bad body odor is not nearly as problematic as restricting smoking.
https://www.ato.gov.au/Business/Excise-and-excise-equivalent...
http://offsettingbehaviour.blogspot.com.au/2009/06/price-of-...
With cigarettes the damage and causation is much clearer. Something like 1 in 2 people who smoke will die early from a smoking related cause. With alcohol the figure is an order of magnitude lower at least.
…
> With cigarettes the damage and causation is much clearer. Something like 1 in 2 people who smoke will die early from a smoking related cause.
But the externalities of tobacco are essentially non-existent: 'second-hand smoke' is one of those invented public-health externalities. Tobacco preponderantly affects those who smoke it (although of course young children of older parents may lose their parents to smoking-related illnesses).
The immediate effects of second-hand smoke on asthmatics are not exactly invented, nor, alas, hard to notice.
— Sign from Ken’s Magic Shop
The big externality for tobacco smoking is the health costs of those who smoke and die and get very sick from it, both early and with health costs.
Even in the US the public wound up footing the bill for the public health costs. At a certain point taxes on cigarettes do cover the health costs. That point may have been reached in Australia. It depends on what people include and how big they make the damages.
It is hard to measure the value of this externality. But in the abstract it must have some value: suppose there was a magic spell which made all secondhand smoke go away, and using it had no negative side effects – how much would the average non-smoker be willing to pay for this spell? Personally I'd be willing to pay at least $1/day, and let us assume the average adult non-smoker puts the same value on it as I do. Then, by rough estimation, I'd say there are about 16 million adult non-smokers in Australia, which implies the cost of this externality in Australia is around $5.8 billion a year. That dwarfs in comparison to the health costs, but it isn't nothing either.
It certainly helped me in the past, and got me through a lot of social barriers.
I'm not saying alcohol and alcoholism isn't a significant problem in many cases, but it has a well deserved social status, which I don't see as going anywhere soon. Smoking has no such status.
This means that using alcohol like you mention, as an occasional social lubricant, is a very viable strategy for many people. Once somebody starts smoking though, most of them can't just stop at will, they're probably doomed to spending all their breaks standing outside in the carpark, every day...
That drastically limits how much you can tax alcohol.
As an aside, I really don't agree with the popular notion that increasing excise (tax) on cigarettes contributes very much to declining rates of smoking. The demand for cigarettes is highly inelastic (i.e. consumers are not very sensitive to changes in price). Heavy taxation of goods with inelastic demand simply results in higher revenue for the government and, eventually, the formation of black markets. Same goes for fuel excise btw: although the (hilarious) justification given is 'road maintenance/user-pays', it is coincidentally another good with highly inelastic demand (making it a pretty efficient tax-base, up to a point). And fuel is such a poor proxy for 'road damage' anyway.
EDIT: Also the argument that smokers cause the (public) health-care system to incur additional costs is pretty suspect. Although he's an ultra-right wing nut, and was practically booed off the stage when he made this point, I think Nick Minchin (former leader of the opposition in the Senate) was right when he suggested heavy smokers cost the public health-case system less overall: they tend to die quickly from an acute disease (e.g. lung cancer) at a relatively young age. This means they die before they hit that 'old age' when individual health-care costs sky-rocket.
The decrease in population wide smoking in Australia this century has not been due to an increase in quitting. It's mainly due to reduced rates of initiation in young people.
http://mike.bailey.net.au/2015/10/smoking-prevention-and-tre...
People who cannot or do not want to quit are being denied information and access to reduced harm alternatives so as e-cigarettes.
It's currently illegal to sell nicotine e-liquid in Australia, thanks largely to hard campaining by a large cancer charity that receives millions on dollars each year from taxpayers to reduce smoking rates.
Look up 'health facism'. It finds a safe space within the "tobacco control" arm of public health. Not all public health advocates are humanitarians.
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/07/the-nazis...
"But according to Proctor, the Nazi ban did manage to do some good for a subset of the population: German women. Proctor estimates that some 20,000 German women avoided lung cancer deaths, thanks to “Nazi paternalism, which discouraged women from smoking, often with police force.”
Well meaning politicians in liberal democracies would do well to consider carefully before crossing the line between encouragement and coercion when trying to modify individuals behaviour "for their own good".
Health facism can include appealing arguments like "the State pays for your healthcare so we can punish you for risky bahviour".
Australia's TGA today rejected an application to permit smokers to legally purchase a safer source of nicotine (e-liquid for vaping), largely due to pressure from the same groups patting themselves on the back for what a great job they've done making life harder for smokers.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/danielfisher/2013/12/12/study-fi...
Two things stand out:
1) Alcohol branding and brand identification is extremely common and deep seeded in the West. It'd be a very hard cultural sell to drop alcohol branding.
2) A lot of alcohol is consumed in bar specific pints, not the packaging it's sold in.
It's like "deep seated" with a reproductive twist.
Specifically, it works because the taxes make it too expensive for teenagers to become regular smokers. That's the most important time to limit tobacco consumption, as we all know.
Research indicates smoking among teenagers has declined by about 65-70% in the 15 years to 2014 [1].
But even regular smokers I know who are well into their 30s are cutting down, switching to e-cigs or quitting, due to the cost. Yes it's for health reasons too, but the cost factor is adding urgency.
http://www.tobaccoinaustralia.org.au/chapter-1-prevalence/1-...
I have never seen anyone fined for smoking in any of the places where it isn't allowed (sporting fields, bus stops, etc), and I see people smoking at these locations literally every single day - especially at bus stops. The whole legislation seems to be "smoke and mirrors".
I'm in NSW, and there is a NSW Health website where you are meant to report places to investigate. I have done so about a couple of locations where people smoke where they're not meant to, and nothing has happened. People continue to smoke at those locations regularly. You never get a case number, or any indication whatsoever that anything has been done at all. Police do not enforce smoking bans, and will readily admit that their policy is not to.
Even places as famous as the Manly Beach corso, where smoking is banned, have smokers there every day. Rangers there do nothing, and as I said police do nothing. I have spoken to a ranger on the only occasion I have actually seen one there, and he said that he "usually gives a warning". When pressed, he admitted that he had never actually fined anyone.
Another glaring and infuriating omission to the smoking situation in Australia is in apartment blocks. My neighbour continues to smoke regularly, which comes right into my living room. Apparently I have no right to fresh air in my own living room, and have been told as much by the police.
Smoking is not permitted within 4m of outdoor public eating areas, but my living/dining room is closer than 4m to my neighbor's balcony, yet I have no protection there.
Why are the rights of smokers to smoke taken more seriously than the non-smoking majority's right to not inhale secondhand smoke?
These laws need to have actual teeth, and be enforced.
Addicts cannot be relied upon to do the right thing, or apparently even the bare minimum required by law.
Most people have never had a serious addiction, so they don't understand that smokers NEED to smoke.
I trust peer-reviewed studies over your "feeling" about what is harmful, and besides, the smell is disgusting, worse than literally any other smell I have experienced. I don't want that in my living room, plus it gives my partner asthma attacks. I don't think it's fair that someone should get asthma attacks because of someone else's addiction.
Nobody needs to smoke anyway. There are many good options for quitting if you have motivation and willpower.
[1] https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/t...
I'm from Brisbane and it's extremely common on Friday and Saturday nights to see police and council workers in pairs fining people in the city and similar suburbs who are smoking in incorrect areas, or who have thrown their butts on the ground.
If you smoke, don't even think of visiting Queensland.
Give up the fags, it'll be the best thing you ever do for yourself. If you don't like patches, Zyban is quite effective and low side effect.
I'm a non-smoker and appreciate the cleaner air, but I find the bans weird when the city also allow pop-up flame grilled chicken vendors in the same space, putting out far more smoke than any smokers ever did.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-11-05/trans-pacific-partners...
The TPP would drastically increase the number of nations with reciprocal ISDS agreements. In particular it would have included the US, where many/most of the the tobacco companies are domiciled.
Why the TPP would probably have not included retrospectivity, it could have frustrated any future efforts.
See also the outcome of Phillip Morris v Uruguay
Yeah, it sure is wonderful to repress a hated minority. How dare they befoul our pristine public spaces with their benighted culture and their foul customs‽
Of course, the victims of your repression might feel a bit differently than you do.
Cigarette's are addictive. They choose to smoke as much as an alcoholic chooses to drink or a heroin addict chooses to shoot up.
As such, smokers can avoid feeling repressed simply by quitting smoking, and they can save money and improve their health in the process.
What gives you the right to oppress people for the behavioural choices? What gives you the right to tell someone that his health is more important than his happiness?
I don't believe that you have that right.
Back when I played in bands, one of the aspects I hated about it was playing in the bars that allowed smoking. That very habit you are talking about caused my clothes and hair etc. to stink of tobacco smoke after the gig. Instruments would likewise smell like an ashtray and have to be aired out. I'm sure that wasn't good for my lungs, either.
I no longer play out, which means thankfully I can avoid any establishment that still allows smoking. I value my health and happiness too; second hand smoke isn't very healthy, and stuff that stinks of tobacco doesn't make me very happy.
The official stats on smoking exclude the black market and greatly understate smoking rates.
I understand the urge to reduce smoking. I find it weird that prices are so high because I think it encourages a black market. Black markets are somewhat dangerous, as there aren't the quality controls in place. The other option seems to be to switch to nicotine gums most of the time, which carry their own health risks.
I find it even more appalling considering the dismal rates at which people actually succeed dropping the habit, which is something like 6%. For those already smoking, it might seem hopeless. I support some tax on them, even though I smoke, but I wish they'd save the highest price at least until we are better equipped to handle the addiction part of it.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2017/01/23/a-third-of-ci...
White people are quitting in droves for sure, but Asians still seem to smoke a lot.
I have no numbers here (are they even collected?) but anecdotally it's unusual for white people to smoke in their own homes, but common for Asian families here.
Note that this is different from the "poorer end of society" mentioned in TFA - race is not an indicator of affluence or social standing in Australia.
Anecdotally, the number of college-aged Asians you walk past in the street that are smoking is much higher than the number of college-aged caucasians. I won't pretend to know which portion of which demographic is immigrant or not, but Melbourne imports absolutely huge numbers of international students, a large portion of whom come from Asian countries and who have grown up in a country where smoking is not the social-taboo it is among millennial Australians.
Among older generations, I don't see the same marked divide. Older Australians smoke much more frequently than their younger counterparts.
As a side note: I don't know a better way to separate out Australian-born "Australians" who may be of any race, including Asian, from "international students from Asia", so if any of my phrasing comes across smelling even slightly offensive please let me know.
Amused by the timing :-)
(If I'd guessed, I would've assumed smoking was less prevalent in Melbourne (because of the reasons mentioned in the article, but mostly the cost), although I've not actually paid enough attention to compare.)
(We all agreed it seemed more common in Europe, very vaguely speaking.)
I think it's culturally hard for them to give it up, which is a real shame as I hate walking through clouds of smoke on Little Bourke St.
Not sure what can be done about it though, banning it outright I think is too far as it's an assault on people's personal freedoms but I would like to see a ban on smoking on the street/public places.
I don't want to be secondary smoking the stuff, it smells awful and probably does a decent chunk of damage if you are walking through it every day though that is unsubstantiated, I haven't read any studies on secondary smoking.
Atleast most smokers here seem responsible when disposing the butts. Silver lining I guess.
While the goal is admirable (eliminating smoking once and for all), without strong enough social norms in place discouraging smoking, all this will do is create another lucrative black market drug (much like what happened when the US prohibited alcohol from 1920 to 1933).
People aren't smoking in restaurants. At pubs, they are forced into a dodgy little area, often near gambling machines. And outside offices, they often hide around the side near alleys because they are discouraged or embarrassed about smoking out the front.
My concern here is over timing. I'm not sure that smoking has been sufficiently socially marginalised to the point that a black market would not form if we banned cigarettes. We've seen this already in Australia. The ATO (where I used to work) has had compliance teams in the field for at least a decade now dealing with the 'chop-chop' problem (black market tobacco), which grows larger with every excise increase. In a sense, banning it is the equivalent of setting excise at some rate approaching infinity per cent.
I don't have any control over what the Tasmanian parliament does, but I really hope they understand that they only get about 1 shot at this per decade at most. If they pass this law and it turns out smoking is not sufficiently marginalised, and a black market subsequently forms, they'll spend the next 3-5 years fighting the black markets, another 3-5 debating and eventually re-legalising cigarettes and then we'll be back to where we are now.
Although it requires a bit more patience, it might be safer to wait a couple more years as the 'outdoor smoking laws' strengthen social incentives and norms. They might even be able to come up with additional measures to accelerate this process.
I agree that we're close to the point where banning cigarettes is feasible. But whether we've actually past that point...
I believe it actually works the other way too. If your friend group is primarily made up of smokers who are forced to go outside the pub/restaurant etc. multiple times in an evening you might decide to start joining them. I know a tonne of people who only 'smoke when they drink' for this reason and many others who started like that and now smoke full-time.
Somebody born after 2000 has never bought thier own cigarettes.
The only information that I could find just said that it was being considered, and that was from July 2016.
0. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/12/world/europe/russia-smoki...
From cinema screens to small screens to billboards. I was driving behind a bus and had to stare at a larger than life cancerous growth being operated on. I don't even smoke, so why must my field of view be contaminated by this horrible imagery? Everyone must suffer the offensive ads because a few people smoke. Way to go Australia. Bring back the ladies underwear ads for buses please, I'm trying to concentrate!
I strongly support the progressive anti-smoking policies in Australia, but I do think the nanny statism has come a bit far in other areas. For example you can't catch a taxi or go to the (now 100% non-smoking) pub with a child. What the hell? Makes it really hard to stop for a drink when you are carrying a kid and walking to the nearest mass transit facility in the stinking hot summer sun, because you can't catch a taxi. Come on, people take buses without seat belts all the time ... it's off the charts stupid to ban young families from the use of taxis!
I don't understand about the taxi. What do you mean?
Regarding the pubs, I live in Queensland and have never seen a 100% non-smoking pub. They always have a dedicated smoking area.
Taxis typically don't come with such seats and so they will refuse to carry you.
In my NSW experience, you're not allowed to smoke within X meters of an indoor pub (even outside on the public pavement), and certainly not indoors, which makes it smoke free. That said, they probably have special exceptions to allow aircon for farming sadcases at gambling machines in special rooms.
Can't catch a taxi with a child? Where is this factoid coming from? Children under 12 months without a child restraint have to be in the back seat (airbags), and children over 12 months just have to occupy their own seat, not be on someone's lap.
Also, here in Victoria, pubs aren't 100% non-smoking. Only indoors. You can smoke outdoors at a pub - the area just needs to have one 'side' open to the air, whether that's the roof or a wall.
Personal experience. Sounds like Victoria is sane, my experience is in NSW.
But then, I believe that cigars & pipes are an essential part of the good life. Can you imagine a world in which C.S. Lewis & J.R.R. Tolkien didn't head down to the Eagle & Child to enjoy a pot of ale and a few good pipes together?
My father in law has had problems on his lungs and heart since I know him.
I married my wife 6 years ago. His father was hospitalized at the time (again). He was exceptionally discharged from the hospital to attend the wedding, and went back there the next day. You know what he did while he was there? Distribute cigars. And smoke them.
He recently died of pulmonary and heart-related problems. He was 60, but doctors said that his lungs and heart looked like 90. Months before he died, blood was failing to reach his feet, so they gradually had to cut them down: first the toes of one foot. Then the other's. Then a whole foot. Then the other, and part of the leg. It was at this point when his mind started to crack. He started saying that he wanted to die.
The last 3 years of his life, he spent 90% of his time at hospitals. At the end, he was a shadow of himself, physically and mentally. At least he could meet his only grandchild once, before he passed away.
That is being down.
You don't want to be there. Before you get there, anything that deviates you from that path, kicks or whatever else, is a good thing in my view.
/s
By massive invasions on basic human rights.
There are also many campaigns that don't, but many do and they are the most effective.
It's using the police and state to use force to deal with people who are doing no harm to anyone but at best themselves.
I think this breaks basic human rights.
Secondhand smoke is disgusting, and so dangerous that it has been proven to kill thousands of non-smokers [1]. I'd call causing death, "harm".
Also smoking in private is still legal, unfortunately.
Hardly a "human right".
[1] "Since 1964, approximately 2,500,000 nonsmokers have died from health problems caused by exposure to secondhand smoke." - https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/seco... - Stats from the US, from the first google result I came across.
some people want to control what they do with their own bodies and not be slaves to the state. gtfo
This gives other people complete control over their body too – in terms of not having to breathe in your smoke.
And this is why people vote Trump.
I never mentioned second hand smoke, it's irrelevant to the conversation, if the science is there then ban it where it harms others. Australia does this for instance.
You just picked something that conforms to your world view which you later admit since you say its not even relevant to you, you still want to control other human beings.
"Also smoking in private is still legal, unfortunately."
The fact that I'm directly harmed by cigarette smoke is a minor nuisance compared to the enormous costs to society.
Also: which human right is it you are referring to here?
Same can be said for any dangerous activity. Like bicycling? As long as I pay for health care, I'm not going to allow you to do it. Driving? Hell no! You need to walk, and you can't use roads or sidewalks near roads. Only the rich can use roads, we're putting on a driving tax.
This. Once you socialise the costs of something it becomes increasing easy to justify laws banning it. Welcome to creeping authoritarianism.
The solution: stop socialism. Or if you must, tax at a level sufficient to cover the costs, but no more.
I already pay more in taxes than the average person earns in gross income, I don't owe you or society jack shit.
http://hrlibrary.umn.edu/edumat/hreduseries/hereandnow/Part-...
I'm not sure where "right to smoke cigarettes" appears in the list.