Tell everyone you know who likes Socialized Medicine

That they’d better take up smoking to show their support for those programs.

Thank you for smoking

There are some differences in detail between the Senate and House bills authorizing massive expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), yet the competing plans have this much in common: Some states will be winners, others will be losers, but they’re all going to have to recruit millions of new smokers. This is because both plans depend on an increase in the federal tax on cigarettes, with the House version upping the levy 45 cents and the Senate 61 cents. Unfortunately, economic reality makes clear just how imprudent it is to take such a course.

There are two ways in which this is true. First, raising the federal tax on smokes will decrease sales. Even congressmen know that a higher price for a commodity reduces the number of consumers able to purchase it. The hitch here for SCHIP and the states is that the latter also tax cigarettes, which means they will lose revenue as a result of the federal increase.

Add a higher federal tax to those factors, and it is impossible to envision sufficient revenues to finance SCHIP as Congress intends. So Congress will need millions of new tobacco customers to replace those who quit, die or reduce consumption. At least 9 million new smokers will be needed during the next five years to ensure sufficient revenues to pay for the expanded SCHIP program. And that illustrates yet another law of economic reality — government actions almost always have unintended consequences, and they are usually bad.

Light em if ya got em, single payer advocates.