Congress Tax/Deficit Debates Overlook Big $$s

Dec. 16, 2010 - PRLog -- Members of Congress are angrily debating a tax bill estimated to cost $858 billion over 10 years (less than $86 billion/yr), with many outraged that it contains some $8 billion in earmarks, yet none seem concerned - or prepared to do anything about - a cost of some $193 billion each and every year caused by smoking, notes Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), America's 1st antismoking and nonsmokers' rights organization.

Only about 13% of Americans smoke daily, yet smoking costs the American economy almost $200 billion a year in totally preventable expenditures, while this huge black hole of waste is being totally ignored as Members fulminate about cutting the estate taxes for wealthy Americans at an estimated cost of $23 billion - a pittance compared with the $193 billion a year the Surgeon General just estimated that smoking costs the economy, most of which is now paid by nonsmokers in the form of much higher taxes and bloated health insurance premiums, says public interest law professor John Banzhaf, Executive Director of ASH.

A similar blindness to the costs of smoking occurs with regard to deficit reduction plans. Although it admitted that "federal health care spending represents our single largest fiscal challenge over the long-run," the Deficit Reduction Commission ignored the largest and most easily controllable cause, and instead made proposals it admits will result in savings which are only a tiny percentage of those which would result from not ignoring the elephant in the health care room, says Banzhaf.

For example, the Commission proposed to reform the "doc fix" to save $3 billion a year, to slash a long-term care insurance program to save $11 billion, to save $6 billion by cutting medical education, and to save a whopping $2 billion a year by reducing legal redress for injured patients, but it suggests nothing to reduce the almost $200 billion smoking drains from the American economy each year.

A tax on the tobacco industry to require it to pay just half of what it costs us all each year would reduce the deficit by about $100 billion; far more than all their other health-related proposals combined, and one which is apparently supported by the majority of the public according to recent polls and surveys. It also places the burden directly on those who are a major cause of the deficit, and not on innocent bystanders like doctors, hospitals, medical students, patients, etc.

Another approach would be to ban smoking in public places. Since it is well documented that banning smoking in workplaces and public places is the major factor in persuading people to quit or not to start smoking, a federal ban on smoking similar to that already enacted and working well in many states would slash the totally unnecessary costs of smoking. The cost to the federal government of such a policy would be zero, but it would reduce the deficit by tens of billions of dollars, argues Banzhaf.

As a alternative, the federal government could simply advise states that significant federal funds would be withheld if the state did not adopt nonsmokers' rights laws similar to those already working so well in many diverse states. This zero-cost program would likewise help to slash the deficit, while at the same time protecting the great majority of Americans who don't smoke from the many health problems caused by inhaling secondhand tobacco smoke.

Rather than quibbling about a few billion dollars one way or another in the tax bill or any deficit reduction package, Congress should get serious about tackling something which by itself is responsible for over 15% of the deficit, and dwarfs many of the costs of the tax proposals.

Fortunately these costs could be slashed at no cost whatsoever if Congress followed the lead of many major countries and banned smoking in workplaces and public places. An alternative would be for Congress to use federal financial support as a carrot to persuade those states which haven't already done so to protect nonsmokers from secondhand tobacco smoke.

PROFESSOR JOHN F. BANZHAF III
Professor of Public Interest Law at GWU,
FAMRI Dr. William Cahan Distinguished Professor,
FELLOW, World Technology Network, and
Executive Director and Chief Counsel
Action on Smoking and Health (ASH)
America’s 1st Antismoking & Nonsmokers' Rights Organization
701 4th St., NW
Washington, DC 20001, USA
(202) 994-8330 // (703) 527-8418
Internet: http://ash.org/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/AshOrg