NEW YORK CITY – Tobacco
companies are taking Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the New York City Council to
task, the New York Daily News reports. Facebook ads proclaim that “raising
taxes and implementing a ban on the display of tobacco products is a bad idea.”
Sponsored by R.J.
Reynolds, the ads and website, www.transformtobacco.com,
are fighting Bloomberg’s anti-smoking measures before the Council, including
one that would prohibit retailers from having tobacco
products on display, implement a minimum price of $10.50 per cigarette
pack, add penalties for retailers who sell contraband cigarettes, and jack up
the smoking
age to 21.
The site contends that
“retail and wholesale employees’ safety could be in jeopardy” because “a
truckload of cigarettes could be worth up to $2 million. And a tobacco tax
increase means that cigarettes will become even more valuable, making cigarette
theft and burglary more common at every stage of distribution. From convenience
store robberies to warehouse break-ins to truck hijackings, cigarette crime is
expected to increase — putting the men and women who work with cigarettes in
danger on the job.”
Transform Tobacco
expressed concern on its website that “higher cigarette taxes increase
gang-related and other organized crime. An increase in tobacco taxes will
escalate an already thriving underground market, making it more lucrative for
gangs and other organized crime outfits to steal, smuggle and funnel
black-market cigarettes to consumers. In fact, the higher the tax increase, the
more lucrative the illicit profits made by criminals and the less legal profit
made by retailers and wholesalers. Illegal sales also cut into revenue
projections by state governments.”