What Price,
Intolerance?

By Norman E. Kjono

Los Angeles, CA - From The Washington Post. A May 2, 1998 article headlined "Smoking ban in bars cuts drinking, tips":

"Customers were drinking and tipping less, but fighting more, after the nation's first statewide ban on smoking in bars went into effect in California, says a survey by the Washington-based American Beverage Institute.

The Survey, conducted by KPMG Peat Marwick, selected 300 bars or taverns randomly from a list of 7,216 bars throughout the state and interviewed their owners in January and February. It concluded that bar business has been off by an average of more than 26 percent since the law went into effect Jan. 1."

California tavern owners are losing hundreds of millions in revenues per year, not to mention lost tips and wages from cut-backs. While tax receipt figures will quantify the precise level of damage at year's end, at only $10,000 per month average revenue, a twenty-six percent revenue reduction for 7,216 taverns is nearly $20 million per month. That figure excludes consideration of lost tips, lost wages, or reduced wholesaler sales. Hundreds of millions per year seems to be a paltry estimate.

On the same day The Washington Post gave another illustration of the costs of orchestrated intolerance. An article by Spencer S. Tsu, headlined "Democrats In Va. Fault Tobacco Bill," says:

"`We don't want some scheme in Washington for retraining to be fast-food workers. We already are the highest-paid skilled workers in America,' said Daniel G. LeBlanc, president of Virginia's AFL-CIO. The labor organization represents 30,000 tobacco-related workers and 200,000 employees statewide."

Mr. Hsu also points out in his article that the average wage for those employed in the cigarette industry is $55,000 per year.

Estimates for the economic impact of the McCain anti-tobacco legislation presently before the senate include a 40 to 60 percent decline in tobacco marketing. $55,000 times 30,000 employees is $1.65 billion in wages. If the economic impact of current legislation is truly a 60 percent decline in USA cigarette marketing, that's over a billion dollars per year in lost wages.

Adding tobacco and hospitality wages together, we are looking at $1 billion or more in lost wages. Then consider beverage wholesalers and suppliers. Those costs are realized by all employees, whether or not they smoke.

What are the total lost personal and corporate tax revenues? Hundreds of millions.

So what is orchestrated intolerance of tobacco, and persons who smoke, worth? Hundreds of millions? Billions? When factoring in the
cost to middle and lower income households of the tobacco settlement, hundreds of billions?

Oh, I see: this isn't about intolerance. It's for the public good, to eliminate the evils of tobacco from society.

Regardless of the reason used to justify a policy, the costs and consequences of that policy are the same. Creating a good excuse for looting our neighbors and members of our communities doesn't change the consequence of it: people get hurt, families lose jobs, and many become a burden when they had contributed.

We should also examine the assumption that anti-tobacco is not deliberate and orchestrated intolerance of a government defined target group. On December 12, 1989 the National Cancer Institute stated its standards for anti-tobacco efforts: to use the experience of activists to reduce public tolerance for tobacco use. In those "standards" NCI defined persons who smoke as a "target group."

NCI adopted a policy in 1989 of reduced tolerance for a state-defined target group. By 1996, the majority of Americans support the idea that intolerance of our neighbors is fine, so long as it's about the "right thing."

Bigots always have a well-developed rationale, excuse, for why their personal brand of intolerance or hatred is "correct." We've seen it in the USA, in "studies" that "proved" how certain ethnic groups were genetically inferior. We see it today in the "studies" that "prove" those who smoke are a social liability.

The above is the bad news. The good news is that feigned ignorance, selective stupidity, and intolerance always cost. It's just a matter of time until the benefits realized from this particular hate campaign aren't worth the costs and grief that it inevitably imposes.

Unfortunately, as always, it will leave behind the carnage of lost employees, hurt neighbors and damaged communities.

Who will make it right again, for them?

Redmond, WA May 4, 1998

Copyright © Norman E. Kjono 1998