Is There Support For Increasing Excise Taxes on Both Cigarettes and Smokeless Tobacco Products in Your State

Raising cigarette prices through excise tax increases is an effective policy that reduces cigarette use and can be used for tobacco control program funding. Several states have recently increased taxes on cigarettes but not on smokeless tobacco, thus missing an opportunity to further reduce tobacco use and prevent possible switching of use to cheaper tobacco products. Public support is a major determinant of a state's success in enacting tobacco tax increases. Monitoring support is needed to inform legislative efforts to enact excise tax increases.

We analyzed data from the 2009-2010 National Adult Tobacco Survey (NATS). Prevalence estimates and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI) were generated to calculate national and state estimates of support for tobacco tax increases if funding were used to improve public health among US adults aged ≥18 years (n=118,141) by race, age, income, smoking status, and dual tobacco use.

Most adults supported cigarette tax increases (70.8%;95%CI=70.3-71.4%), with state estimates ranging from 60.1% (95%CI=57.1-63.2%) in Arizona (AR) to 79.0% (95%CI=75.1-82.8%) in the District of Columbia (DC). In all states, >90% of adults who supported a tax increase favored an additional $1-2 tax increase. Most adults also supported smokeless tobacco tax increases, ranging from 62.7% (95%CI=59.7-65.7%) in AR to 80.9%(95%CI=77.2-84.6%) in DC. Chi-square analysis showed that support for cigarette and smokeless tax increases was highest among Hispanics, adults with higher incomes, and never smokers (p<.01).

Support for cigarette and smokeless tobacco tax increases is strong. These results may be useful for state legislatures who are considering passing tobacco tax legislation.