Data Bases • Custom Term Papers • Free Term Papers • Free Research Papers • Free Essays • Free Book Reports • Plagiarism? Links • Top 100 Term Paper Sites • Top 25 Essay Sites • Top 50 Essay Sites • Search 97,000 Papers @ DirectEssays.com • Search 101,000 Papers @ ExampleEssays.com • Search 90,000 Papers @ MegaEssays.com Free Essays • Term Paper Sites • Chuck III's Free Essays • Free College Essays • TermPaperSites.com • My Term Papers • Get Free Essays • Essay World • Planet Papers	Search Lots of Essays Back to Subjects - Business Smoke Signals Smoke Signals The article “Smoke Signals”, by the New York Times and the New Jersey Sunday edition, presented an overview of for the state of New Jersey’s recent decline in cigarettes bought in the last year. The article starts off by explaining to the reader how smokers took a financial beating at the cash register every time they went to a convenience store to buy cigarettes. In a smokers reduction movement the state of New Jersey doubled the sales tax on cigarettes forcing smokers to spend an extra forty cents on every pack they bought. Len Fishman, the state commissioner of Health and Senior services, stated that the tax increase was meant to drive down the consumption entirely. As Mr. Fishman traveled around the state he discovered that many people were already trying to quite smoking, they just never had the right physical motivation to pursue their goal. These people explained that the dramatic increase on tax was the finale straw that broke the camels back, and provided the right motivation for them to quite smoking. The tax increase put New Jersey behind only Hawaii and Alaska at $1 a pack, and Washington state at 82.5 cents a pack. Over a six month period the revenue collected from cigarette sales had dropped by 12 percent. For 1998 the revenue earned by cigarette sales should have been roughly 54.2 million cartons, but with the tax increase that number had been dropped to 47.4 million cartons. This gap represents a 6.8 million carton difference, an outstanding decrease in cigarette sales. To all smokers the tax increase means a substantial amount of money will be necessary to maintain their habits. Some smokers will go through great lengths to save as much money as possible, even if it means traveling to other states to buy their smokes. Both Pennsylvania and Delaware reported a significant increase in cigarette sales over the next six months after the tax took affect. Over a one year period Delaware even had a ten percent increase, manly due to the tax increase in New Jersey. The state of Massachusetts raised their tax 25 cents a pack in 1992 and reported a 12.5 percent decrease in sales the following year. Certainly a more alarming statistic is not necessarily how much the tax has decreased the sales of cigarettes, although very impressive and healthy, but rather the percent of under aged children and high school students who already smoke and who are beginning to smoke. In a recent study conducted by the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research towards high school seniors found that nearly 24.6 percent were already daily smokers. The same study also revealed that nearly 19 percent of all high school students, 9th - 12th grades, were already daily smokers. This is an alarming statistic because of the influence that adult smokers are imposing on the younger generations. In relation to the economy a tax as significant as the sales tax on cigarettes in New Jersey can only be classified in one category, elasticity. This term economists use to describe the sensitivity within a small variable that was cast into the economy. In this case the tax was just suddenly exposed to the state of New Jersey and in just a one year period the sales of cigarettes dropped 12 percent. Not only did the tax have an effect on Jersey but the surrounding states enjoyed a mild revenue boost from desperate smokers who will do anything to save a little money and maintain their habits. The tax on cigarette sales can be related to many aspects of every day life from tax sales on food and clothes all the way to the rise in the price of gas, which is a necessity to anyone who owns a car and has to transport themselves to and from work everyday. Since I have been alive the price of gas has increased considerably all the way from seventy five cents a gallon to a dollar eighty per gallon. That is more than a 100 percent increase and that becomes very hard to deal with especially when people can barely afford to stay alive just doing what they are doing. Now granted that did not go up all in one interval, but I can remember that it did jump nearly forty five cents per gallon not more than five years ago. People who have to fill up every four or five days end up spending an extra thirty five to forty dollars per paycheck, which could be used to put food on the table or to pay the electric bill. The gas increase has defiantly played an important part in many peoples lives, as has the cigarette tax. The difference is the gas tax affected everyone in a pricey way, the cigarette tax only affected people in New Jersey. The tax is a very good thing because it improves the overall health outlook on the society. Bibliography: The New York Times, “Smoke Signals” The New Jersey Times Sunday Edition, The New York Times Company, January 10, 1999. Word Count: 825
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