Raising Taxes on Cigarettes - Essay Example

One of these challenges has been to remedy the fact that the use of cigarettes remains the single and largest preventable cause of death and disease in the United Kingdom. According to Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) based in the UK, over 100,000 smokers in the UK die annually from smoking-related causes.  The harsh reality is that there are about 12 million adults who smoke cigarettes in Great Britain for instance. This is approximately a sixth of the total UK general population. Similarly, 17% of adult women and 23% of adult men are smokers. Smoking rates have more than halved since the early 19the 70s (Davies, P. 2007 p., 7Basedsing on these statistics, the overall achievement in improving the United Kingdom's health status thus depends greatly on succeeding on dramatic reductions in the rate of cigarette use among both young people and the adults. 

The proposal to raise the taxes on cigarettes and use the additional revenue to fund various programs in the United Kingdom may be seen to be of capable achieving a dual goal. One of which could be reducing the number of premature deaths resulting from smoking and raising billions over the next ten years to finance early childhood education, for instance. Extensive research also shows that cigarette taxes minimize smoking rates and extend lives (Gruber, 2000 p., 57). An investigation of more than 150 international studies articulates the empirical conclusion that: “Significant increases in cigarette taxes are an effective cigarette control strategy and results in significant progress in UK public health.” By taxes increasing on a cigarette, prices to consumers are raised likewise and these lower the consumption rates. Increasing tobacco product prices would directly discourage current cigarette users from using cigarette products. One way that these strategies would be effective is that when the prices of cigarettes are higher it prevents potential cigarette users from taking up its use, in the long run. Through these strategies, the government can mitigate smoking-related dd health problems of the citizens. Moreover, global experiences with cigarette taxation and tax administration have for years been used by WHO. They have done so to create a set of practices for enhancing the effectiveness of cigarette taxation (James, 2009 p., 115).

Raising taxes on cigarettes is an effective way of both raising revenues for governments and mitigating smoking-related health problems of citizens. This is tired of a fact that individuals of lower income are the most responsive to an increase in price compared to individuals in the higher income bracket (Edlin et al., 2000 p., 87). Based on these macroeconomic facts, they can be targeted to mitigate smoking habits and at the same time raise more revenue to the government. Individuals with incomes below the median lower their cigarette consumption or use by four times more than individuals with incomes above the median assuming that both groups are responding to an increase in prices of cigarettes. Since low-income individuals are more sensitive to an increase in cigarette prices, this group of individuals will be more likely than their counterparts in the higher-income bracket to smoke less or quit cigarette smoking in totality. According to the macroeconomic theory of “price elasticity of demand”, World Bank used it and expressed that one out ten increases in the price of a cigarette pack always result in a 4% lower tobacco consumption in high-income nations. Based on statistics, increased taxation on a cigarette that subsequently raises prices is directly related to smoking habits.

Mitigating smoking habits among the youth can only be effective through increasing taxes. The youthful population is economically dependent on their parents and guardians. Increasing taxes directly affect their consumption habits since they are more responsive to price elasticity (Owing, 2004 p., 17). The government hence can benefit substantially from these revenues. Youth begins smoking at an earlier age, and this can be attributed to the availability of some cheap brands of cigarette in the market. Increased taxation thus not only avails extra revenue to the government but ensures that the demand for a cigarette is lowered within the borders of the UK (Cordes, 2005 p., 35).  However, various considerations support cigarette taxation as a way to lower consumption.