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Tobacco By Katherine Kersten Minnesota's $6 billion tobacco free-for-all is about to begin. Folks, get ready to witness the boondoggle of the century. Forget the fact that the tobacco lawsuit was waged in the name of the taxpayers, ostensibly to compensate them for the smoking-related costs they have borne. At this moment, organizations ranging from HMO's to ad agencies to schools are lined up 12-deep to grab a piece of the mind-boggling tobacco windfall for themselves. Any group that can't come up with a glittering prize will be slow-witted indeed. Here's the situation. As part of the tobacco settlement -- secretly negotiatiated by Attorney General Skip Humphrey -- a board was set up to parcel out $202 million for smoking cessation programs and research. Not content with this massive sum, Humphrey and a phalanx of interested groups have been agitating for legislative approval of another $650 million, to be spent over a period of years. If you add the $300 million that Blue Cross plans to spend, that's $1.15 billion for anti-tobacco programs in Minnesota. The scale of the sums involved here is monumental. Gov. Arne Carlson -- who is trying to wake us up to what's going on -- has done the math. 1.15 billion dollars is 16 times the annual budget of the entire Minnesota Department of Health, and 150 times what Minnesota will spend on AIDS prevention and treatment in 1999. It could finance a 20 percent property tax reduction for every Minnesota homeowner for 2.3 years. What are we going to get for this investment? Skip Humphrey assures us that, among other things, we'll get "the most comprehensive anti-smoking program the world has ever seen." The Smoke-Free 2000 Coalition -- a group of health-related organizations -- echoed Humphrey's promise this fall, when it lobbied Minnesota school boards to add their voices to its call for a $650 million appropriation. Recently, the Minnesota School Board Association (MSBA) voted overwhelmingly to do so. Apparently, when you announce you're against teen smoking, people don't feel the need to question your plans. Seems they can't sign on the dotted line fast enough. How did the Smoke-Free Coalition persuade the MSBA to jump on its $650 million bandwagon? The Coalition's "Vision for the Future" highlights "success stories" in three states -- California, Massachusetts and Florida -- and promises to build on their successes here. According to the Coalition, in these enlightened states, anti-tobacco programs have "reduce[d] tobacco consumption dramatically." Exhibit A is California's $129.5 million anti-tobacco effort, initiated in 1989 and financed with a 25-cent per pack tax. The Coalition asserts that "[i]n the first three years of the program, cigarette consumption fell by more than 40%...." It's true that legal cigarette sales have fallen dramatically in California. But many smokers are finding other ways to get cigarettes. Before the tax increase, they hoarded them, making the immediate decline in demand appear steep. After the increase, contraband cigarettes began flooding the state, smuggled in from Indian reservations or military bases, from nearby Nevada, or -- most importantly -- from Mexico. One 1996 study found that contraband cigarettes may account for as much as 23 percent of cigarettes sold in California. What about California's "hard-hitting" anti-tobacco media campaign? Following initial declines, smoking rates leveled off in 1994. In 1996, the California Tobacco Survey found that the smoking rate for 18 to 24-year-olds had almost reverted to its 1990 level. In 1998, a state-funded study reported that "the California Tobacco Control Program [has] clearly lost its original positive effect on reducing smoking...." According to John Pierce, the study's author, "There are a lot of indications that things went wrong with the program." "It's time," he concluded, "to decide you can get [the effectiveness] back -- otherwise you've got to go out of business." The Smoke-Free Coalition's second "success story" is Massachusetts. It claims that after a cigarette tax-financed campaign began there, "The cigarette consumption rate fell more sharply... than in the rest of the nation... Young adult smoking rates fell from 29.4 percent to 21.6 percent." Funny. The Washington Post reports that teen smoking actually went up by 10 percent in the first three years of Massachusetts' media campaign. Gregory Connolly, director of the state's anti-tobacco effort, told the Post that warning labels and educational ads can actually backfire. "Among kids," he noted ruefully, "you get a backlash anytime Big Brother goes after them." As for the decline in adult smoking, it's useful to remember that Massachusetts is right next to low-tax New Hampshire. Guess where many Massachusetts smokers are buying their cigarettes now? Regarding Florida -- the Smoke-Free Coalition's third success story -- anti-tobacco programs there are so new they have no track record. Well-intentioned educational and media campaigns won't stop many kids from smoking. After tobacco advertising was banned or heavily restricted in Finland, Sweden and Australia, teen smoking rates went up. Canada recently cut its high cigarette taxes, concluding that rampant smuggling was making it too difficult to control teens' access to cigarettes. According to a recent study in the RAND Journal of Economics, young adults in high-tax states actually get more tar and nicotine than their peers in low-tax states, because they smoke longer and stronger cigarettes. The Smoke-Free Coalition insists that Minnesota spend one dollar on anti-tobacco media efforts for every four dollars the tobacco industry spends on advertising. But research suggests that cigarette ads don't induce people to start smoking. Their primary effect is on brand loyalty. Health-related anti-tobacco ads, in particular, are likely to fall flat with youth. Besides their "forbidden fruit" effect, they simply give kids no new information. Harvard economist Kip Vincusi has determined that teens already believe smoking to be a greater health hazard than the surgeon general's reports indicate it is. Fortunately, there is one clear way to curb youth smoking -- we can vigorously enforce the laws on the books. In addition, we can fine teen smokers or suspend their driving privileges. This, of course, this won't cost a fraction of $650 million. As things stand now, a 21-member board -- 15 of whom are appointed by the attorney general -- is about to begin doling out massive sums of anti-tobacco money. This board is not subject to legislative supervision, or the gift ban and other safeguards of the Ethics in Government Act. As Gov. Carlson says, it's a scandal waiting to happen. Minnesotans had better watch closely, or their tobacco windfall may go right down the drain. -- Katherine Kersten is a director of Center of the American Experiment in Minneapolis and a commentator for National Public Radio's "All Things Considered." |