If indeed these programs are so vital to the health of our state's children, it seems ironic to fund them with a sin tax. If the goal of reduced smoking were to be achieved, the funding would dry up. But there is very little evidence that raising the tobacco tax reduces smoking. In fact, since tax increases on certain products are directly linked to expanding black markets for those products, they often make it easier for underage teens to get cigarettes. No tobacco smuggler is going to be concerned with asking for identification.
Smokers also resort to crossing state lines to acquire cheaper cigarettes.
The societal cost argument is likewise flawed. Smokers do indeed run up higher medical expenses than non-smokers in the early years of their lives. But because of their shorter expected life spans, as a group they incur fewer medical costs and pension-related expenses in old age, such as social security and nursing home expenditures. This figure excludes the excise taxes that smokers alone are responsible for paying. These taxes not only discriminate against smokers as a group, but also against low-wage earners within that group.