Sin taxes are the real sin being perpetrated.

SamCogar · by SamCogar on Tue Jun 23, 2009 2:47 am

"When people are stressed out, they smoke and drink and play the Lottery more," he said.

Though May, cigarette tax collections are at $99,579,279 -- about $1.98 million, or 2 percent, ahead of estimates.

Smokeless tobacco taxes are also running about 1.35 percent, or $675,528, ahead of the $4.98 million year-to-date estimate.

Likewise, liquor revenues are up 1 percent, or $1.13 million ahead of estimates, at $13.9 million.

The only sin tax falling short of estimates is the beer tax, and its year-to-date collections of $7,555,175 are just 0.01 percent behind the projected $7.6 million.

And, as McKown alluded, overall state Lottery profits are down about $4.5 million from the same point in 2008, a decline of 0.83 percent.

West Virginia's relatively low cigarette and smokeless tobacco taxes may account for those revenues running ahead of projections, McKown noted.

At 55 cents a pack, West Virginia's cigarette tax is lower than all its border states but Virginia and Kentucky, each at 30 cents a pack. However, on July 1, Kentucky's tax will double to 60 cents a pack.

West Virginia's tax is well below Maryland ($2 a pack), Pennsylvania ($1.35 a pack) and Ohio ($1.25 a pack),

http://www.wvgazette.com/News/200906220687

11 months of sinful tax collections:

$5,655,528 – snuff/chewing tobacco profits
$7,555,175 – beer profits
$13,900,000 – liquor profits
$99,579,279 – cigarettes profits
$542,168,675 – lottery profits

$668,858,657 TOTAL SINFUL PROFITS

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Aaron · by Aaron on Tue Jun 23, 2009 6:33 am

It is how FDR paid for the New Deal.

**ziggy** · by **ziggy** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 11:14 am

These are the taxes easiest to legally avoid paying.

Just don't buy the stuff.

Aaron · by Aaron on Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:08 pm

LOL...And's that how liberals justify taxing the poor at a higher rate to pay for the programs that are supposed to help them. What a load.

**ohio county** · by **ohio county** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:23 pm

You're exactly right. Poor people are taxed progressively on sin taxes. This exposes the sham that liberals just want to look out for the little people. It turns out, they just want to boss somebody around...

SamCogar · by SamCogar on Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:26 pm

Socialist lefty authoritarians always have a simple excuse for an answer for unjust treatment for selected groups of people.

They think it is perfectly alright for the government to levy horrendous taxes on tobacco users to pay salaries of public employees and health care for poor children ...... and use everyone's taxes to pay for all healthcare, housing, workers comp and/or disability payments to drunks, dope addicts and obese people because they can't help themselves, ....... they all have a disease they can't control.

**Stephanie** · by **Stephanie** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 1:04 pm

What, poor people are not deserving of liberty?

SamCogar · by SamCogar on Tue Jun 23, 2009 1:11 pm

Not at the expense of the working poor.

**ziggy** · by **ziggy** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 2:43 pm

So why do none of you refute my suggestion that the way for the poor- or for anyone- to avoid the so-called "sin taxes" is simply to not buy the "sin products"?

Nothing beats taxes on products like the consumer- whether rich or poor- who says, "I'll be damned before I buy that over-taxed product"- and then doesn't.

As Cato says, it is about choices and conduct. And our choices about what we chose to buy or not buy has consequences- about as direct consequences as anything we do in life.

**Stephanie** · by **Stephanie** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 3:37 pm

There are other options. You can brew your own beer and wine etc, and more and more people are doing so.

Now, don't poor folks deserve liberty too?

**ohio county** · by **ohio county** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 4:08 pm

Oh, no. Nanny government says that smoking is no good for the poor. The government will, therefore, in their own interests, tax tobacco beyond their ability to pay for it. Government knows best.

Ziggy doesn't that take free choice away from the poor? To answer your question: yes, poor people can make the choice to quit. They can also be forced into it by a government that makes their choices for them and then enforces those choices through taxation. Avoid the sin taxes? Wouldn't it make more sense to overthrow the government that restricts their freedoms?

**ziggy** · by **ziggy** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 4:50 pm

Ziggy doesn't that take free choice away from the poor?

No, I don't think so. Actually, it makes the choices more starkly apparent.

To answer your question: yes, poor people can make the choice to quit. They can also be forced into it by a government that makes their choices for them and then enforces those choices through taxation.

But the article Sam posted tells us otherwise- that "sin taxed" purchases are increasing.

Avoid the sin taxes? Wouldn't it make more sense to overthrow the government that restricts their freedoms?

Maybe, but the government doesn't allow that to happen.

Anyway, the only folks I see advocating overthrowing the government are folks who- whatever they are- are not poor. So I have to question how genuine is their concern for "the poor".

**ohio county** · by **ohio county** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 4:55 pm

Well, I'm not advocating taxing them until they submit to my will... Back at you.

**ziggy** · by **ziggy** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 5:10 pm

Former Jackson County Republican Delegate Bill Carmichael (now deceased) told me that he figured the best kind of tax was one that people were most willing to pay.

That was his justification for voting to get the state deeper into the "lottery" business almost 20 years ago- but which I was opposed to.

Maybe he was onto something. The more state operated gambling opportunities there are, the more money folks seem willing to plow into them.

**Stephanie** · by **Stephanie** on Tue Jun 23, 2009 7:07 pm

It's really disturbing to hear that some think liberty should be available only to people of affluence.

Sin taxes are the real sin being perpetrated.

Sin taxes are the real sin being perpetrated.

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