Maine Fuming Over Tax - September 2005
Benjamin Snow started smoking as a teenager.
Now 49, he thinks about quitting every day, but he doesn't plan to do so anytime soon, even as Maine prepares to increase its excise tax from $1 per pack to $2 to help balance the state budget.
Snow, who lives in Portland, smokes a pack a day and says he can afford the extra $7 a week, or $365 a year.
But he wonders about the smokers who can't, calling the cigarette tax regressive because smokers tend to have lower incomes than nonsmokers. He also found it hypocritical that some lawmakers justified the increase by saying it would encourage smokers to quit.
"It's duplicitous," Snow said. "I question their priorities and their intent."
The tax increase, which starts Sept. 19, is expected to raise an additional $46.8 million during the coming fiscal year and eliminate the need for the Legislature to borrow money to fund state government. The increase targets the estimated 22 percent of adult Mainers who smoke.
Snow, who is Portland's marine operations manager, believes legislators took the easy way out. He figures they chose to raise the tax on a legal product that has been demonized in the last decade. It was easier, he said, than reducing state spending or increasing other taxes - sales, corporate, real estate - that are opposed by strong lobbies.
To him, raising the cigarette tax to rescue the state budget is bad public policy.
"Why would you base the economy of your household, your business or your government on the behavior of addicts?" Snow said. "It doesn't make sense. What if we all quit? It's just not responsible. We're living beyond our means, there's no question about that."
Snow and other smokers wonder what would happen if the Legislature tried to levy an excise tax on coffee or scratch tickets or any other more acceptable habit. They figure nonsmokers should be concerned that one of their favorite activities will be targeted next.
"It's a very slippery slope we're on. Just because it's not their ox that's being gored," said Rose Kouroyen, 58, of Bangor. "When does it stop? When do they stop trying to control people's lives with the tax code?"
Kouroyen and her husband, Stephen, 61, say they are resisting what she calls the "jihad" against smokers, and that they're willing opponents of the "partnership for a smoke-free universe."
They decided to fight back three years ago, when they started rolling their own cigarettes. It takes about five minutes to roll 20 cigarettes using a metal machine, paper tubes with filters and loose-leaf tobacco, which costs about $15 for a pound bag. Each pack they roll costs about 85 cents - far less than Maine's average retail cost of $4.47 per pack.
"We started rolling our own when (the tax) got too onerous," she said.
Rose Kouroyen, who is a bookkeeper, started smoking when she was 11. Stephen Kouroyen, who is a carpenter, started when he was 10. They dispute studies that tout the cost of smoking-related illnesses on the American health-care system. They say nonsmokers wind up costing the system more because they live longer.
"People should be thankful because we drop dead earlier," Rose Kouroyen said, her voice tinged with sarcasm.
"Life is full of risks," she continued. "We all choose our own path in the inexorable march toward death. It's nobody else's business what I do with my own life.
"I just had a physical. Perfect heart. Perfect blood pressure. My doctor said to me, 'You obviously take good care of yourself.' Smoking probably isn't the healthiest thing you could do, but not everyone is a yogurt-eating runner."
Rose said she considered growing her own tobacco, which is catching on in other parts of the country. Instructions are featured on several smokers' rights Web sites. Growers must wear long sleeves and pants to prevent skin contact with tobacco's irritating itch. They also need significant space to process and cure the leaves.
"If it weren't so much trouble, I probably would grow it," she said. "I have enough trouble growing tomatoes."
Not everyone is so eager to fight.
Bob Mills, who lives in Biddeford, used to be a heavy smoker. He's down to two or three packs a week and calls himself a social smoker. He sees the cost of everything going up, including gasoline, and he's ready to cry uncle. He says the pending cigarette-tax increase may inspire him to quit smoking altogether.
"It's like I want to quit driving," said Mills, a 40-year-old property manager. "Everything's going up and this is one way I can save some money. I also don't want to support the tax because I feel I'm overtaxed now."
He said recent bans on smoking in restaurants, bars and other public places, along with the state's anti-smoking campaign, may encourage his decision.
"You're already having to smoke near the Dumpster," he said. "You're pretty much ostracized if you smoke."
Snow doesn't plan to quit, or grow his own, or drive to New Hampshire, where cigarettes cost less and the excise tax is lower. He already spends about $35 a week on cigarettes, and he's prepared to shell out another $7 come September.
Still, he's offended by the prospect of paying more for something he has the right to do.
"At the end of the day, smoking is a legal activity," Snow said. "In a society where we have freedom of choice, we should be allowed to do it and not be penalized for it."