Raising cigarette price unlikely to stop teens

Thursday, May 28, 1998

By ELIZABETH AUSTER
THE PLAIN DEALER

Nobody asked me, but on the subject of smoking, I figure I have at least as much expertise as the average member of Congress.

So before the Senate finishes debating its latest plan for making cigarettes hard to get - a plan that would raise the cost of cigarettes by more than a dollar a pack - I'm going to throw my few cents in. For what they're worth.

I don't claim to be an expert on the subject, just a former smoker who still enjoys an occasional cigarette the way other people enjoy an occasional cigar. This makes me an oddity: someone who sees the risk in smoking, but also the benefit.

As such, I tend to be wary of high-powered campaigns like the one now under way in Washington to stamp out teenage smoking by raising enormously the price of cigarettes on everyone else.

What troubles me about this plan is not its stated goal: discouraging kids from smoking. That part makes sense.

What troubles me are two other things: first, the likelihood that this experiment will fail, because teenagers are pretty good at getting things they want, no matter how expensive; and second, the certainty that the cost of this experiment will be borne not by the pols who designed it, but by ordinary folks too powerless to prevent it - ordinary people who can't afford the sort of luxuries that members of Congress routinely enjoy, but for whom smoking remains one of the few affordable pleasures in life.

The notion that smoking might actually have some redeeming value - that it might bring genuine pleasure to a large segment of the population, along with its toxic side effects, will strike some people as ludicrous. That does not make it untrue.

Plenty of people smoke not necessarily because they are addicted, but because they regard smoking as one of life's great pleasures - a pleasure akin to cappuccino, filet mignon or chocolate sundaes for other people.

It may be hard for nonsmokers to understand the taste for cigarettes. But clearly, the taste for cigarettes is not an uncommon one. And for those of us who have it, for those of us who see smoking as not merely a dangerous habit - but also an enjoyable one - it is not so easy to join the bandwagon in favor of slapping a huge new tax on something so many people enjoy.

Smoking is certainly risky. So are many pleasures. Too much cappucino and you bounce off the walls. Too much steak and you end up in cardiac arrest. Too much chocolate and you go into sugar shock.

Perhaps we should tax all forms of physical pleasure that can lead to health problems. But then we run into the problem of mental health, which just so happens to benefit from a certain amount of physical pleasure.

That's worth considering before we go about depriving people of modest means of one of the few pleasures many feel they can afford. It is fine for people who have tennis courts in their back yards, personal trainers at the gym and spas in their vacation plans to preach about public health for the poor.

But maybe they should sit for a while on the porches of people who can't afford air conditioning, let alone vacations, and see the pleasure a simple cigarette can bring to a man eager for a smoke after a long day at work.

Maybe they should consider that it is not necessarily in the best interest of the poor to force them to pay more for smoking. If the price of cigarettes goes up by $1.10 a pack - the current Senate proposal - many poor people will face an unpleasant choice: They will have to give up smoking, switch to cheap brands they dislike or settle for spending less on everything else they need besides cigarettes.

Meanwhile, the poor will watch as the wealthy continue buying their favorite brands of cigarettes with little effect on their budgets. That knowledge is likely to leave low-income smokers feeling more helpless than ever. This is not a recipe for health.

If the politicians' goal is to discourage kids from smoking, they should think more about what draws kids to smoking. In my own case, I started in my 20s because I thought smoking was part of being a reporter. I thought smoking was cool.

I still remember how my older brother, who already was addicted, solemnly warned me of the danger when I started: If I kept smoking, he said, I would become addicted. Then quitting would be murder.

I laughed at his warning. Not because I questioned his sincerity, but because I was too proud to believe I could ever become addicted to anything. I'm not the type to become addicted, I told myself. He's just giving me a speech, being a big brother. No problem, I'll show him.

My brother turned out to be right, of course. By the time I realized I was addicted, quitting wasn't easy, just as he had warned.

Now, looking back, I think he might have been more effective if he had been more strategic - if he had focused less on convincing me that smoking was unwise and unhealthy, and more on convincing me that it was uncool.

I would have listened harder, I suspect, if he had argued that smoking can make a woman unattractive - that it can dry out her skin, stain her teeth, leave an odor on her clothes. He might have gotten my attention by issuing a warning scarier to young people than any surgeon general's report: the warning that smoking can be hazardous to a person's attractiveness.

My advice to federal officials: If you want to discourage smoking, focus on what really attracts people to cigarettes. Try getting the respect of the people you want to influence, instead of their money.

Messages for Auster may be left at 999-5335.

©1998 PLAIN DEALER PUBLISHING