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Comment by sien | Hacker News Reader

The cost of smoking in Australia is probably the main thing that has cut smoking rates. At $20+ a pack smoking is so expensive.

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.

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And it's a regressive tax that mostly punishes the poor for smoking. Not to mention the ridiculous prices of alcohol. It's no wonder meth is exploding in popularity.

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.

It certainly is a regressive tax, but is it really punishing someone if you make it more expensive to legally purchase something that only damages or kills them, is highly addictive and that only places an overall burden on society? After all, despite its flaws we in Australia have a great, free healthcare system, with an extensive quit smoking program. We tend to find that adequate and free government health services mean that the poorest in our society are looked after far better than in a society that has cheap booze and cigarettes and an incredibly expensive healthcare system.

I guess it depends on the priorities of your wider society. I think ours is pretty right, personally.

Depends on how the calculations are done but it can be shown to save money overall. Smokers have a tendency to die much younger and more rapidly which saves the health and welfare budget a tonne, smokers are certainly aren't causing the population aging.

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.

While it's technically true I've always hated this argument. Yes, smokers are without doubt cheaper for the healthcare system because they die earlier and faster. It's completely missing the point though, because the entire reason we have our healthcare system is to provide a long and high quality life for the population. Someone dying earlier may be cheaper, but it's also a failure.

The entire reason we have our healthcare system is so that a long and high quality life is an option for the population. It seems pretty apparent to me that most people aren't optimising for either though. No reason to get paternalistic with it.

Smoking imposes one person's choice on many others, in terms of length and quality of life, via the negative effects of passive smoking (and also just day-to-day---I personally hate having to suffer through someone's acrid fumes). If people smoked without releasing the byproducts into the air everyone else breathes, this argument would make more sense. But even then, there's massive money and expertise behind advertising (etc.) for getting people hooked, against what may be their "actual" preferences.

An easy problem solved by restricting use in public locations, which we already do to an extent. However a person quietly poisoning themselves in isolation within their own home is still unnecessarily and unfairly affected by tyrannical sin taxes.

They also have higher health care costs due to smoking, which in Australia costs billions of dollars in increased health spending. I think it's not unfair to have them subsidise their cohort's inevitable health care costs.

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.

Everyone releases stuff into the air that effects others, from perfume to car exhaust to barbecues. Why is your car exhaust ok but not my cigarette smoke?

There are legal limits placed on exhaust. VW is one recent example of this. If I were to pump exhaust from my car into your home, I'm sure there would be repercussions. I believe there are regulations with respect to perfume as well— yup, there are ADA guidelines in the US[0]. I can imagine cases where barbecues have been considered a nuisance. Found an example of that, too.[1]

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 you wanted to run your exhaust next to me in a restaurant I'd complain about that.

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.

> If you wanted to run your exhaust next to me in a restaurant I'd complain about that.

That's fine, I'm not a fan of smoke in restaurants or indoors anyway. It's already banned here.

> If your exhaust pipe was pointed at my face on the sidewalk again I'd complain.

This is exactly what cars are doing on the sidewalk. It's not like the emissions travel in a straight line. No one is blowing smoke directly at you either.

> A lot of offices have gone to perfume/cologne free because it is offensive to a lot of people.

Never heard of this.

>This is exactly what cars are doing on the sidewalk. It's not like the emissions travel in a straight line. No one is blowing smoke directly at you either.

This is wrong go walk on a sidewalk near a smoker and you'll see them blowing clouds which go in peoples faces as they walk by and leaving clouds in the faces of people walking behind them. This isn't an issue of being in the vicinity of the smoke it is having to walk through the cloud of it.

Go outside an office building around 9, 10:30 or lunch time and you'll often have to walk through a large cloud as all the smokers hang out to get in their smokes.

Smokers are in general super inconsiderate about their additions effect on other people in public.

>Never heard of this.

Google scent free office or fragrancy free office it's not uncommon these days.

> This is wrong go walk on a sidewalk near a smoker and you'll see them blowing clouds which go in peoples faces as they walk by and leaving clouds in the faces of people walking behind them. This isn't an issue of being in the vicinity of the smoke it is having to walk through the cloud of it.

The only difference is the visibility, just because you can't see car exhaust doesn't mean it's not there.

> Go outside an office building around 9, 10:30 or lunch time and you'll often have to walk through a large cloud as all the smokers hang out to get in their smokes.

Yes, because it's about the only area left to go for a smoke. It's an effect of banning it everywhere else, not smokers being inconsiderate. If there was a nice out of the way area where smoking was allowed then people would go there.

>The only difference is the visibility, just because you can't see car exhaust doesn't mean it's not there.

The only difference is proximity as I already mentioned.

>If there was a nice out of the way area where smoking was allowed then people would go there.

There are lots of out of the way areas in most cities for people to go smoke. But still you'll find them huddled outside the entrances to buildings or as close as they are allowed to be.

As I said. Smokers are selfish and will try to justify every negative impact of their addiction on others. They aren't being inconsiderate about smoke you're forcing their hand. They don't want to litter but it's your fault for not providing ash trays, etc, etc.

I smoked for 20 years and I've heard countless reasons from smokers for being inconsiderate but they all basically boil down to selfishness.

> I smoked for 20 years and I've heard countless reasons from smokers for being inconsiderate but they all basically boil down to selfishness.

That explains it. Ex smokers always rant about smokers as a way to deal with the cravings they still have. This isn't about the smell of smokers, it's about you wanting a cigarette when you smell them.

>Ex smokers always rant about smokers as a way to deal with the cravings they still have.

No cravings here.

>This isn't about the smell of smokers, it's about you wanting a cigarette when you smell them.

Definitely not. The smell is enough to make me gag when I'm stuck around a bunch of smokers. I look back on my years of smoking embarrassed to know how badly I certainly smelled that whole time. It really is a disgusting addiction.

None of that changes anything I've said though. But given that you've switched to deflection now I think we're done here.

I've never been a smoker and everything sanswork has said, I could have written myself.

I don't care if people smoke, I just don't want to smell it, and I don't want to inhale it. I would not have any problem with people injecting or eating nicotene as much as they want. I just don't want to be forced to inhale it against my will.

And besides the horrible health effects, it smells worse than anything else. Yes, I can smell that you had one before you got on the bus, the stench is overpowering. And yes I can smell you smoking literally 75m away. It's totally gross.

All the strawman arguments about vehicle exhaust gas are irrelevant because at the end of the day smoking has no other utility. Society accepts (a regulated amount of) exhaust gases because we need transport and we can't make a car that does not make emissions currently. If we could make a car that did not cause emissions, it would almost immediately be illegal to make a car that did emit exhaust, and with good reason.

Like sanswork said, at the end of the day smokers are just super selfish and blame others for being "too sensitive" because they are too lazy to change their inconsiderate behaviour.

There are plenty of places you can smoke, those places just aren't conveniently amongst the general population anymore, 90% of whom do not, and don't want to smoke.

Anyone who smokes while walking down the public footpath is selfish and inconsiderate, and anyone who throws their butt on the ground is selfish and inconsiderate.

The "4m from any entrance" and whatever laws are the bare minimum required by law. Nobody likes your addiction. Enjoy the hell out of your cigarettes but please keep your shameful habit to yourself, far away from all the people who don't want to inhale it or smell it.

Not a smoker, never been a smoker, agree with sanswork. Smokers are generally very inconsiderate about their habit. Not everyone, but most of them. They throw them on the ground even when there's an ashtray. They throw it out their car window. They smoke right outside the door. Even if there's a sign that says be 50 feet away from the door, they'll be -maybe- 10 feet away.

Since they get used to the smell they don't realize how awful it is to be that close to the door, or how bad it is when they come inside. I imagine a lot of them don't know about the environmental effects of throwing it wherever, but to be fair I see the same attitude with plastic bottles being all over the damn place.

Earlier but not necessarily cheaper, as they will pick up other forms of repiratory and cardiovascular disease before they expire (not every smoker end up getting incurable lung cancer, and its not like they should be refused treatment kf they do). Not to mention the secdonary harm they cause to the others.

I good portion of them would end up with some other chronic disease if the live to an older age.

It's not a failure of the health system though. Not everyone wants to optimize their life for living longer.

> Not everyone wants to optimize their life for living longer.

It would be real nice if they would refrain from optimizing the lives of everyone around them for not living longer as well.

I like that line of thinking. Can't we make it more efficient though? Like, have a live grenade in the filter of every 1% of cigarettes to blow off the smoker's head. Есть человек — есть проблема, нет человека — нет проблемы.

Had to google translate your little saying there.

There are people - there is a problem, there are no people - no problem

I like the idea.

Well, thank god our friends and relatives are dying young so I can save a bob or two in tax!

>with an extensive quit smoking program

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.

Can't speak to ecigs in particular, but most of the ads I've seen push addiction-combating substitutes like nicotine patches.

>It certainly is a regressive tax, but is it really punishing someone if you make it more expensive to legally purchase something that only damages or kills them, is highly addictive and that only places an overall burden on society?

Yes.

That's a very short and unconvincing argument. Do feel free to expand on it!

> [smoking] places an overall burden on society

Are you sure about that?

I am sure.

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).

http://www.health.gov.au/tobacco

I am. I've had to sit in smoke-filled cafes (nearly all were so) and to take busses and taxis filled with smokers. I have had to passively smoke in billions of public places and there's no opt-out from that. I'm so glad that in my country, Turkey, a smoking ban in public interior spaces is in effect, and I think that's what really reduces the number of smokers along with people learning how harmful it is. I'm not so keen about the effect of raised prices though.

It's a pity you're being downvoted, because your first paragraph is factually correct. I guess people don't want to hear it if it conflicts with their (mistaken) preconceptions.

The language is heavily loaded. What about tobbaco being punishing for society (especially passive smoking), or tobacco companies being punishing for their addicted user base? Taxes drive people to meth? This badly sounds like fear mongering from lobbies, "let people smoke our cigarettes, or they'll become junkies".

It's been highly effective at lowering the smoking rate. In a country with taxpayer funded healthcare.

Citation? If you're talking about Australia btw (where I live), I'd suggest that's a highly debatable proposition.

'Curbing the epidemic: Governments and the economics of tobacco control'[1], World Bank, Washington DC, 1999, pp. 37–45 and C Gallet and J List, 'Cigarette demand: meta-analysis of elasticities'[2], Health Economics, 12/10, 2003, pp. 821–835.

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

Smoking has been gradually phased out here over the course of 30 years. It used to be that around 40% of adults smoked, and now it's down to 10-12%. If you think that smoking rates haven't changed significantly here over the past few decades, you're either very young or very blinkered.

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.

I'm not questioning that smoking rates have dropped. That's absolutely true, and an easily verifiable fact. What I'm questioning is the assertion that higher taxes on cigarettes have been the primary cause of this reduction in the smoking rate. It's important that we carefully account for all the factors at play and arrive at a considered answer. If we do this, we then know the most effective way to combat, and hopefully one day, eliminate, smoking.

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.

Social pressure probably dominates the total cause of smoking reduction, I would bet. I personally won't join a friend outside a bar for their smoke: it's cold and I hate the smell, I'll stay in here thanks. Also a lot of people actively find smoking and smokers disgusting, which eats away at the "cool" factor it used to have.

I think that the banning of smoking in clubs, pubs, and cafes had a significant effect. Now if you want to smoke you need to leave all your friends who don't smoke leave the club and then queue to get back in.

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'm a very happy non-smoker but I would think that the biggest reason for smokers to stop nowadays is the leper colony stigma aspect.

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.

While I applaud your scientific rigor, why not do everything that might work and leave it at that?

As far as I am concerned, a cigarette tax should stand until proven harmful, not only if proven beneficial.

The smoking rate has dropped down to nearly single digits. They exact cause is impossible to tell.

You know what? Screw it. Believe whatever you want.

> In a country with taxpayer funded healthcare.

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.

This isn't true.

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...

(2) http://www.health.gov.au/tobacco

The $30B figure you quote has to be pure hyperbole. It isn't possible to tell from the link you provided but I assume it must be allocating a monetary value to human life along with lost tax revenues and productivity due to early death.

$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.

Well, I tried to stay away...

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).

Thank you.

I agree that we shouldn't be arguing in favour of anti-smoking regulations on the grounds of financial cost (esp. with regard to the health budget). There are, as you say, much better grounds to base the argument on. Exaggerated figures such as the $2B / $30B given above just help to discredit the entire argument. I prefer that my government not try to manipulate me with dodgy statistics (even if we largely agree on the goal of reducing smoking).

The main cost of smoking in that study is value of life, the cost of premature deaths.

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.

> 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.

In many countries retirement insurance is automatically witheld from salary.

In Poland it's 19,52% of salary. https://www.mpips.gov.pl/ubezpieczenia-spoleczne/ubezpieczen...

In Australia it's 9% http://crr.bc.edu/briefs/australia%E2%80%99s-retirement-syst...

Actually medical costs associated with smoking are extremely significant. I'm not aware of any studies showing that they are less than average costs associated with death in old age.

I don't know Australia, but in Poland total taxes from tobacco and alcohol are similar to income tax, and to healthcare budget.

-Tobacco and alcohol tax: 40 billion PLN 2013 [1]

-Personal income tax 42 billion PLN 2012 [2]

-Healthcare budget: 64.5 billion PLN 2013 [3]

Cigarettes (and to a lesser extent alcohol) account for 2/3 of whole healthcare, for everyone!

And smokers pay retirement insurance for whole life, statistically getting nothing. Especially when being male; females have 5 years lower retirement age and live 7.8 years longer. 5+7.8+10=22.8 years difference. So a male smoker pays every month, but gets nothing.

[1] - http://natemat.pl/77753,alkohol-i-papierosy-sa-dla-polskiego...

[2] - http://www.pit.pl/aktualnosci-podatkowe/2011/archiwum-2011-v...

[3] - http://pulsmedycyny.pl/2642297,42366,znamy-budzet-nfz

The post you replied to had how much it raises in Australia: AU$2B/year. That compares to AU$258B/year in income tax[1]. The health, aged care and sport spending allocation is AU$89.5B[2]

[1] http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/mf/5506.0

[2] http://www.health.gov.au/internet/ministers/publishing.nsf/C...

That's interesting! Completely different.

Here you go, latest Inter-Generational report: http://imgur.com/a/UWFAa

Your tax/public expenditure curves cross roughly when you turn 62. By 70 the government spends on you more than twice what you pay in taxes. 75 it's 3 times as much. 80, it's 4.5. The expenditure curve is pretty much asymptotic by that point.

Exactly, smoking costs a lot more than the taxes raised.

Worse, it uses up the free hospital beds and there is a waitlist.

The revenue of taxes isn't specifically allocated in this way in Australia. Another way of looking at it, the federal government doesn't specifically dictate that x% of the health budget must be allocated to subsidising the healthcare of smokers vs non-smokers.

Lowering the smoking rate increases health cost significantly. Old age medicare is the bulk of state funded healthcare. Smokers die young so their net burden on the healthcare system is significantly reduced.

That's a fallacy. Smoking costs $31.5 billion dollars a year in increased health funding in Australia.

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.

I see this quoted all the time and I wonder if it takes into account the total economic benifit of the individual. I'll conceed that an individual who lives longer will (on average) cost more in health care. I also believe it when I hear that lung cancer is a cheaper way to die than many other ways. But what about the lost 20-30 years of economic output that would have taken place if the individual lived? On top of that we see benefits that can't easily be calculated, like being able to leave children with their grandparents for care. Can't do that if they're dead.

I've read a study before (sorry don't have a link) and the timing tends to work quite well, you smoke and work until retirement, then die - give or take a few years.

> 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.

This is the second time in this thread I've seen this claimed. I haven't seen any evidence showing this, and in Australia at least it's difficult to prove. For example, residential aged care is expensive, but generally privately funded and a major source of employment.

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....

The ageing population is why we need to invest heavily in automation, and get away from the "creating jobs is good" mindset and into the "creating value is good" mindset.

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.

Not really, cancer treatment is ridiculously expensive.

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.

> regressive tax that mostly punishes the poor for smoking

"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.

Every tax punishes the poor first, but what's the other solution: Let the cigarette be affordable for the poor? According to the theory that poor people make bad life choices[1], they'll smoke anyway; so the discussion is only whether the higher, middle and smart-lower classes would be deterred by taxes on toxic products, and the answer is yes, so let's not enter into a fallacy about the poor people to deter us from saving the rest of the people.

[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.

I think its not just the tax, but the combination of plain packaging (strong imagery) and the laws regarding where people can smoke. It makes it harder for people to continue to smoke, providing motivation to quit.

However, I think its more about providing a strong deterrent for potential new smokers.

So is lotto. Rich people mostly don't smoke or play state lottery.

While I'm both an avid user of e-cigarettes and I'm not eager to use them for harm minimization, their banning would be deeply concerning to me. It has not been demonstrated that they are a health risk, and it is vanishingly unlikely their health profile is anywhere near that of combusted tobacco, so banning it would amount to a dogmatic fear of nicotine.

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.

> banning [e-cigs] would amount to a dogmatic fear of nicotine.

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.

No ecigs blow their garbage in my face. Use all the nicotine patches you want. Literally coat your body in them. I just don't have to inhale the vapors. I have 0 interest in inhaling your exit vapors.

I could say the same thing about your vehicle exhaust, which unlike ecig vapor, is bad for your health.

I bike and walk when I can. But I don't sit next to you in the subway and blow vehicle exhaust in your face.

There hasn't been enough research about e-cigarettes to say whether or not they're a health hazard people who are around users.

And many of us who are anti-smoking (and anti-vaping), are also supporters of public transportation and reducing car usage.

We have no reason to believe they would be a health hazard. Vegetable Glyrecin is approved for food consumption, most flavour concentrates likewise and, nicotine, well, at worse it could raise someone's blood pressure a bit, but due to the nature of vaping, it has been measured that "the level of cotinine in passive vapers is approximately 1200 times lower than active smokers" [...] "In conclusion, the levels of nicotine absorbed from passive vaping are not only harmless but do not even produce any biological effect (not even heart rate acceleration)" (quoting Dr. Farsalinos).

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?

Sure, and I would vote we burn banning or incinerating anything in a shared public space. Not pick and choose X is ok but Y isn't. Just keep shared airspace as clean as possible.

Clean of what though? Burning emissions have an actual impact on the environment, so yes, "clean" does make sense in this case. Vegetable glycerine vapour does not.

Vehicle exhaust is regulated. If it's not strict enough for your liking, work to have the regulations strengthened.

Just because it's regulated doesn't mean the harm isn't being done on enormous quantities.

Indeed. I understand my parent to be saying that since we allow this other thing that's more harmful, we shouldn't be so concerned, that there's an inconsistency. My point is that we do make the attempt to reduce the harm of vehicle exhaust, that we do attempt to limit harm (and nuisances, for that matter). We certainly can discuss whether those protections are adequate. And we very well may disagree on the level of protection necessary. That doesn't mean we should dismiss protections on one because we think protections on another aren't sufficient.

Vehicle exhaust is regulated only because it has been proven to be harmful. Why should something be regulated otherwise?

We also regulate things that are only nuisances. Elsewhere in this thread are examples of where perfume and barbecue smoke are regulated. We have noise ordinances, too.

Noise ordinances to the measure that the noise becomes really disruptive, as in, people can't sleep or function because of it. That is reasonable and regulating is happening only to the extent necessary to prevent this. If it was handled the way Vaping is handled in Australia, there would be blanket ban on music at public places, for example.

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.

And countries actively work on limiting the exaust fumes and subsidising zero emission transport.

You will get about as much nicotine from a potato. Or is it the water vapor that bothers you?

It's not about what it does, it's about respect. It's certainly not my place to dictate others' comfort.

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.

I do not want myself or my children to breath in any chemicals they are absolutely not required. You are free to blow vapes in your kid's face. Please do not require me to pay for their medical conditions down the road though.

The first time I saw an e-cigarette was in a commercial for them. The actor was using one in front of a large, clearly visible no smoking sign, and then arguing with the stewardess when she came to tell him to stop smoking. No mention, as I recall, of any health benefits compared to smoking. I came away thinking that the only purpose of e-cigarettes was to be a jerk to other people.

> I came away thinking that the only purpose of e-cigarettes was to be a jerk to other people.

Unfortunately, I can't say I disagree with you. There's an entire culture around "big clouds", which are extremely obnoxious in public.

In the context of cigarrettes, it's easy to see why they banned it first. Cigarettes hadn't been demonstrated to do harm either. I hope though that the ban would be lifted if studies can show that they are not harmful.

My intuition is on your side though, I imagine they are far less damaging than normal cigarettes.

>Cigarettes hadn't been demonstrated to do harm either

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.

You missed the tense. When cigarettes became popular they weren't banned right away because we had no idea they would become harmful. Of course we know differently now.

In this case, we are erring on the side of caution and banning e-cigs until they are further studied. Learning from our mistakes.

Banning something is a good way to prevent such studies from ever happening.

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.

The physiological effect of nicotine use is pretty well established as in the case of alcohol and IMO it makes no sense to ban ecigs while allowing other forms of tobacco to be sold.

The problem with banning ecigs are that there are people who are currently smoking, who now can't go to ecigs because you banned them and so they continue to smoke normal cigs. They typically don't quit.

Yup. The recent vice (tobacco) tax laws that target e-cigarettes were (in many cases) a hit job by big tobacco to ensure continued cigarette profits. The only e-cigarette vendors that will continue to exist in two years are the ones you see in gas stations, a truly terrible product with massive profit margins typically owned by big tobacco.

I understand that side of the issue for sure. If ecigs are really healthier I see no reason not to have them on the market. But I can understand why regulators are not in a hurry to let an untested and unregulated product roam free.

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 that they are a health risk

It has not been demonstrated they are completely safe either. Some countries take your approach, others a more conservative one.

> It has not been demonstrated they are completely safe either

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.

You're right, that is fairly pedantic. Nothing can be proven 100% safe (except maybe water?).

That doesn't mean a more conservative approach shouldn't be taken when new products enter the market for user consumption.

Certainly far less damaging than cigarettes.

Nicotine itself does have problems. It is, after all, a pesticide.

The last line by itself is a non-argument: Caffeine is also a pesticide, and about as dangerous in and of itself as nicotine is -- and yet no one is rallying around a cry to ban coffee.

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.

The dose is still the poison.

Came here to say that. It is ridiculously expensive there and that is the reason why smoking has dropped. I know plenty of aussie's who still smoke though. To me, the weirdest bit is how cheap it is a short flight away, say Indonesia; I believe I paid between 2 and 1.5 USD per pack, maybe 10 bucks for a carton. I'm in NYC and even the prices here, about 12 USD a pack, have made me cut down considerably.

A short flight? Sydney to Denpasar is 6 and a half hours...

Australian short.

That's short. Getting to the other side of Australia is also a few hours (4 from memory) and Europe takes about a day.

Sorry, yes might have been a bit of a hyperbole but to me a short flight is almost anything that doesn't require a sleeping for 7 hours on the flight.

It's still a long way to go for a durry!

Hour and a half from Darwin.

I've seen high $30's per pack in pubs around Sydney which really kills the idea of just grabbing a pack for social smoking too.

Yeah, but you can't smoke in Sydney pubs any more so that stops it too. As a non-smoker who enjoys the odd drink, I quite enjoy a pub with no cigarette smoke.

The Sydney Publican guide to dealing with smoking bans.

Step 1. Open a pokies room with a slated wall

Step 2. Let people smoke in it and call it "outside"

I hope they ban pokies next.

The pollies get too much money from the gambling sector (casinos, pubs, RSL clubs etc) to ever take real action in the eastern states.

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.

That's crazy. I dunno what prices are like in the US (I don't smoke), but really...I mean at that price it'd probably be cheaper to smoke weed...

It's definitely not. Illegal drugs are also much more expensive in Australia than in many other places in the world. There is a growing problem with black market untaxed "chop chop" tobacco here. The tax increases have made it more and more attractive to both importers and smokers.

For imported stuff definitely. I wouldn't want to have a coke habit here. Weed seems as cheap as anywhere else though.

If you smoke the same amount of weed, it's probably not cheaper, but since it's typical to smoke maybe one joint per day but 20+ cigarettes, yeah, weed could be cheaper.

Where I live in the US a pack of Marlboros is about $6.x

Before we get into pack sizes, they're about $1 per cigarette.

Sin taxes work, I suppose.

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