« Two Birds with One Stone | Main | My Pet Peeve »

January 19, 2007

Conservative Kulongoski comes out of the closet.

Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski intends to fight hard this session to raise cigarette taxes a whopping 70% to provide health insurance for 117,000 low- and moderate- income children who now are uninsured. Over at Blue Oregon they have a poll on the subject which is currently running in favor of Kulongoski's proposal 77% to 23%.

Normally one wouldn't associate regressive taxation with a Democrat, particularly one in such an overwhelmingly Blue state. But that's exactly what this new tax is. Oh sure, it sounds all warm and fuzzy on the surface. I mean, who wouldn't want to help those poor underpriviledged kids enjoy the benefits of health insurance? And don't cigarettes cost about $3.50 per pack (2002) in medical expenses? Seems like a slam-dunk... right?

But, why don't those kids already have health insurance?

Well, because they're in the low and moderate socio-economic demographic which can least afford to pay for health care. And this is where Kulongoski's proposed regressive tax rears it's ugly head.

According to Oregon's own statistics (pdf warning), which mirror national statistics (pdf warning), smokers are disproportionately financally poor and under-educated compared to nonsmokers.

29.9% of Oregonians who smoke earn less than $15 k per year and another 30.2% earn between $15k and $25k. At the other end of the spectrum, among Oregonians who earn $50k or more per year only 11.4% smoke.

Compounding this data is research showing that the gap in smoking cessation rates between those below the poverty line and those above it actually increased between 1983 and 2002, with those above quitting at an increasing rate while those below quit at a decreasing rate. Which gets us well within the modern move to use cigarette taxes to reduce smoking. So draw your own conclussions.

Not surprisingly the Oregon educational stats correlate strongly with the income stats. 29.5% of HS drop-outs smoke and 28.4% of those who only achieved a HS diploma or GED smoke. While only 9.6% of college graduates smoke. Not only that, but the cessation rates (nationally) are progressively tilted in favor of those with a higher level of education too.

But at least increased taxes on cigarettes prevent kids from becoming smokers in the first place, right? Wrong. Studies show that higher cigarette prices simply cause many teens to put off starting smoking until they are adults.

Turning back to the official Oregon stats, among those who have health insurance 17% smoke compared to the 33.6% of uninsured who smoke.

So essentially what Governor Kulongoski wants to do is to force economically disadvantaged Oregonians to pay for health insurance which many of them couldn't afford in the first place.

I thought those kind of tactics were the domain of conservatives...

Posted by Kevin at January 19, 2007 03:45 PM