Health or Money?

The US government's stance on cigarettes vacillates from wanting to keep citizens healthy to wanting the dollars they provide. Read the full article about this amusing (?) dilemma at Camp Campaign, and share your thoughts.

 

Australia has a socialized health care and uses this as the reason they increase the smokers tax every year (and has done for the last 10 years).

Cigarettes are around $20 for a pack of 50 here in Australia, 70% of that is tax.

Without a socialized system, you're obviously not having to pay for others unhealthy habits so what excuse are they using there for the increase?

 

We are using the taxes to help create socialized health care. How is Australia's health care system?

 

Not as good as it should be unfortunately, but sounds like it's better than there.

I wrote about our socialized setup in an earlier thread here

Happy to answer any further questions.

 

Interesting read. Apparently your "semi-socialized" health care system seems a bit better designed than the NHS in the UK. Of particular interest:
Interesting quote:

I couldn't agree more, especially considering many of those profit margins are made on products created from taxpayer money in the first place. Check this out. Merck, one drug company of hundreds, declared it's first quarter earnings:
http://247wallst.com/2009/04/21/merck-mrk-all-bad-news/
$5.4 billion (B) in revenue, $1.4 billion (B) in profit, down from $3.3 billion (B) for the same quarter (3 months) last year. And people complained about the Oil companies making 8% because profiteering on oil was damaging to our economy...

You've also left out a few other major culprits in our health care costs. Most malpractice claims, whether they are valid or not, are settled out of court with generous settlements because it costs more to fight them in court and attorneys fees than it does to simply settle them. Because of this, malpractice insurance is a major burden for any specialized practitioner, and those costs are passed along to the sick.

The higher baseline cost of health care created by the drug and malpractice insurance companies is then made more expensive by the medical insurance providers, since they have to make a profit as well. Most people would never risk a major injury or disease creating bankrupting them, so they put the medical insurance companies between themselves and their doctors, allowing the insurance companies to take a cut of pretty much every doctor's visit, regardless of severity. All of the above drug and insurance companies have very powerful lobbies in Washington, making sure their interests remain untouched.

Our president has approached the issue of fairness first, by making sure all people residing in the USA are insured, regardless of legal status. It is going to be expensive, but I think it is the right place to start. I'm sure he will address the run away costs and corruption associated with the medical care related industries at a later point in time.

 

I think it's reasonable for there to be a high sin tax on cigarettes. But I would never agree with them being illegal. If people want to kill themselves, that's their right.