SALEM- In a Thursday press release, the Oregon Department of Human Services, announced that cigarette sales in Oregon have declined since 2008.
The data found that 183 million packs of cigarettes were sold during 2009 which is down from 189 million packs sold the year before.
DHS credited this to their Oregon Tobacco Prevention and Education Program which launched in 1996. Tobacco sales have decline 46 percent since that time.
“We’ve helped create a state where 83% of adults don’t smoke, all workers are protected from secondhand smoke and young people have less access to tobacco. More than a quarter of Oregon smokers have broken their deadly addiction since our work began,” said Katrina Hedberg who studies factors affecting health and illness for the Oregon Public Health Division.
Sorry DHS but it has more to do with rental property owners no longer allowing smokers and that for several reasons and money savings being the greatest.
That translates for lost excise tax revenue and lost MSA payments. These are just the legal smoke, how about the black market ones? Is smoking really down or are just legal sales down?
What is the Plan B for replacement revenue to make of for these losses. DHS will be screaming for more and more revenue from a declining revenue source. Will Oregon tax candy, soda pop, gum and bottled water to make up for the lost revenue? How about cookies, donuts, fast food and other dangerous legal products until no one legally buys those items?
A smoke free state is a tobacco tax free state too.
LMAO…Not one word about the blackmarket in tobacco sales……………california has one of the biggest tobacco blackmarkets in the world and guess whose next door…….