Will the real Mitt Romney please stand up?
Almost too good to be true.
The Effect of Cigarette Prices on Youth Smoking
From the abstract of this 2001 University of Illinois paper (click above):
‘The results confirm that higher cigarette prices, irrespective of the way they are measured, reduce youth cigarette smoking.’
The paper also found that:
‘If state average prices would rise by $0.50 (i.e. 26.5%), the youth cigarette demand can decline by 17.5 percent: participation would drop from 27.8 to 24.8 percent and the average monthly consumption would decrease from 139 to 130 cigarettes.’
Obviously, this is not new research, and prices have risen over the past decade, but it seems to me that it is any and every Government’s clear and unequivocal responsibility not to be cowed by the tobacco lobby and to continue to reduce smoking rates amongst young people. If price rises are successful in doing this, then price rises we should have.
Of course, the strength of the tobacco lobby is far greater in the USA than here in the UK, but the paper is still highly relevant. Another interesting point is that the largest effect comes from the perceived price of cigarettes: education and society must paint smoking as an expensive habit, as this has a powerful effect in preventing young people from taking up the destructive habit.
How times change. This 1970s US advert shows support for Iran’s nuclear programme, and, indeed, the Shah had previously agreed to build 23 nuclear reactors by 2000, with America’s help. A long way from today’s policies!
