Sin Tax in the Philippines

the use of Cigarettes and tobacco an negatively affect the Mental , physical and Emotional

The smoking habit is the principal cause of illness, disability and death around the world. More than five million of people in the world die due to smoking habit every year. If we don’t take care of this in 2030 the amount will be ten million. Seven million of these deaths would be in poor countries.

Sin taxes account for approximately 4.5 percent of Texas’ state tax revenue (Litten). Tobacco taxes can be divided into two categories: cigarettes or cigars and other tobacco products. Cigarette taxes in 1931 where as low as three cents a back, but now the state has raised the taxes to $1.41 per a pack of cigarettes (Minton). Alcoholic beverages are taxed based on the type of alcohol, for example, liquor, beer, wine, and malt liquor. Also each alcoholic beverage have a mixed beverage sales tax and mixed beverage gross receipts tax. These taxes have shown a trend of being reduced throughout the past 4 years.

In the U.S. almost all of the things harmful to humans are banned except for alcohol and smoking. In Sally Chen’s Smoking Is Bad For Everyone So It Should Be Illegal, Chen makes her case against smoking and other types of tobacco consumption. Chen states that Smoking and tobacco should be banned because “It’s an addictive drug that not only harms the user but everyone else through secondary smoke.”

A. Second hand smoke causes just as many of the same health issues to those around a smoker and as could be produced in the smoker. As reported by the Center for Disease Control, illness from smoking ranges from lung cancer, ischemic heart disease, and chronic airway obstruction as well as shortening a person's lifespan averaging 13.2 years for me and 14.5 years for women (National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion). These are risks that many smokers know may just be regurgitated facts, but is not hearing them once more another chance to decide that health is better than a cigarette? Much of the health issues that society deals with today would be greatly decreased if more and more people began to quit smoking.

The primary reason I think these two items are taxed the most is because they are easy targets politically. It's always a sensitive topic when the government starts discussing tax increases, but when they can make the argument that they are raising revenue in the name of public health, it kind of softens the objections. I do think the tax increases have been implemented to curb the usage of alcohol and tobacco. Most of the efforts have been to try and decrease the number of young people who start smoking and drinking at an early age, these choices made early on can lead to a lifetime of bad health and disease. I think tobacco and alcohol are easy targets because it doesn't affect the majority of the population like say a tax on soda or

excise taxes1. There has been recent interest in increasing the “sin tax” for products such as

People should be allow to smoke cigarettes and to eat fatty foods - both these things are sources of pleasure which, while having serious associated health risks, are only fatal after many decades, unlike a poisonous food or an unsafe car, which pose immediate and high risks. 3) A comparison to hard drugs is inaccurate - tobacco is not debilitating in the same way that many

But we know the truth is not so. Alcohol is harmful for people’s health and sometimes it may bring bad effects to self-impression. And cigarette smoke contains over 4,000 chemicals, including 43 known cancer-causing (carcinogenic) compounds and 400 other toxins. These include nicotine, tar, and carbon monoxide, as well as formaldehyde, ammonia, hydrogen cyanide, arsenic,

“Sin” taxes have been proven as a way to curtail known unhealthy behaviors. Soda taxes are most accepted if taxes collected are earmarked for health specific programs (Chaufin et al., 2010). The cons are the consumers are the voters and taxing may equate to loss of votes, taxing may not be equitable to individuals that do not have the disease, and finally, an undue burden may be placed on lower socio-economic demographics as these groups often have limited access to food vendors that primarily sale what would be considered taxed foods. Though these sin taxes are proven to work well with tobacco and alcohol consumption, altering a persons’ diet needs to be more individualized and realistically approached. Lower socio-economic individuals should not feel added burden as a tax; which would be a negative impact (Kuchar et al., 2005). Legality issues are regarded as low, but would require state government support to enact. This would likely not be popularly accepted and have a minimal impact for any increase in tax rate.

less dangerous than tobacco and people smoke less of it at a time. Or you can

Most commonly, sin taxes are excise or consumption taxes that charge fees for guilty pleasures or human indulgence. (Lorenzi, Sin Taxes 60) Sin taxes, therefore, are intended to encourage citizens to consume or use taxed items responsibly or discourage behavior associated with the consumption of taxed items. Goods or services generally taxed through sin tax policy have some common characteristics including inelastic demand, promote behavior that is harmful to the individual, and promote behavior that is harmful to others. (Lorenzi, Sin Taxes 60) Goods or services targeted by sin taxes have an inelastic demand because they are generally habitual, addictive, or highly pleasurable. (Lorenzi, Sin Taxes 60) Further, these goods or services are targeted by sin tax legislation because consuming or utilizing the good or services can lead to self-destructive behavior, negative consequences for communities, and generally are considered socially undesirable. Thus, sin taxes are not prohibitive; citizens are allowed to consume targeted goods and services as long as the tax is not steep enough to make consumption of the good or service impossible. (Viscusi 556) Further, the voluntary nature of sin taxes is generally more tolerable than involuntary nature of income taxes. (Schmidt, Barr and Swanson 1677)

Thesis Statement: Smoking has many dangerous effects on a smoker 's health and the health of those around them; it harms every organ in the body and leads to premature death.

Sub-point A: You are saving your body from toxins like tobacco.Tobacco contains nicotine, which leads to addiction. By not smoking, you are lowering your risk of cancer.

Finally, the last prevention way is reducing the risk factor from getting the chronic disease. (Dr. Duke Johnson’s, 2009) For example smoking and alcohol can increase the risk factor to get the diseases. As we know, each cigarette contains about 200 chemical compounds that can damages our heart and blood vessels plus the smoke is not only attack the smoker but also people around him. So, we should strictly avoid smoking because it