Skip to content
The Archive of The Carrboro Citizen
Menu
  • Home
  • News
  • Community
  • Schools
  • Business
  • Opinion
  • Obituaries
  • Sports
  • Mill
  • Flora
  • Print Archive
  • About
Menu

Cigarette tax a common-sense policy

Posted on December 15, 2011 by Staff

By Marissa Hall
Faced with a growing budget deficit, North Carolina lawmakers cut $350 million from the state education budget this year. UNC is feeling the effects of these cuts; faculty members have not received raises in three years, hundreds of staff positions have been eliminated and class sizes have increased. Just last month, the UNC Board of Trustees approved one of the largest tuition hikes in recent history. In-state students will see a 15.6 percent increase in tuition and out-of-state students’ tuition will rise by 6.5 percent.

Cuts in state education spending will continue to force the UNC system into difficult choices that hurt one of the state’s greatest resources. The budget deficit cannot be met by spending cuts alone.

Raising the North Carolina cigarette tax is a common-sense policy that would generate nearly $350 million in revenue without cutting education spending. In March of this year, state Rep. Jennifer Weiss and Sen. William Purcell introduced a bill (HB341/SB338) that proposed raising the state’s cigarette tax from $0.45 per pack to the national average of $1.45. But in our current tax-phobic political climate, the bill went nowhere.

North Carolina lawmakers should make the responsible choice and pass HB341/SB338.

Passing this bill will have more benefits than just increasing state revenue. Although many North Carolinians are understandably opposed to tax hikes, taxing cigarettes would actually save taxpayers money in the long run. According to the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, each pack of cigarettes sold costs North Carolinians $7.17 in health care costs to treat the serious diseases caused by cigarette smoking. A $1 cigarette-tax increase would result in an estimated $1.8 billion in long-term health savings for the state.

Not only does a cigarette tax increase make good financial sense, it also has enormous health benefits.

Studies have shown that taxing cigarettes is one of the most effective ways to reduce smoking rates among children and adults. This year alone, nearly 10,400 North Carolina children will become daily smokers. The N.C. Alliance for Health estimates that a $1 cigarette tax increase in North Carolina would lead to a 15.4 percent decrease in youth smoking rates and prevent 81,200 kids from becoming addicted smokers.

Gov. Beverly Perdue has joined many U.S. governors in declaring November as Lung Cancer Awareness Month. Due to successful awareness-raising campaigns, efforts to combat breast cancer have received incredible popular and financial support. But many people don’t know that lung cancer is actually the leading cause of cancer death among both men and women in North Carolina. More than 6,670 North Carolina citizens will be diagnosed with lung cancer this year alone.

The use of tobacco products is the number-one cause of disability and death in North Carolina. North Carolina lawmakers and citizens alike have a responsibility to do everything they can to reduce lung cancer and other smoking-related diseases. Increasing the cigarette tax by $1 per pack would be one major step toward reducing tobacco-related death and disability in our state.

Considering the enormous public health benefits and long-term cost-savings of this effective and common-sense policy solution, state policymakers should pass HB341/SB338.

North Carolina currently has the sixth-lowest cigarette tax in the nation. It’s time for our state to catch up with the rest of the country.

Marissa Hall is a doctoral candidate in health behavior and health education in the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health.

Web Archive

© 2025 The Archive of The Carrboro Citizen | Powered by Minimalist Blog WordPress Theme