Posted on 02/10/2006 8:47:39 AM PST by george76
Enjoy those $6.59 cigarette packs for the next 19 days.
Starting March 1, they'll cost $7.59.
By a 10-7 vote, Cook County Board members voted Thursday to double the county tax on a pack of cigarettes from $1 to $2.
A pack of Marlboro Lights that cost $6.59 at a downtown Walgreens Thursday will be $7.59 next month.
The same pack costs $4.45 at a White Hen in the DuPage County city of Elmhurst, and it costs $3.76 at a Hammond, Ind...
Commissioners voting against the tax hike said shoppers will increasingly hop borders, hurting Cook County businesses.
With the hike, Chicago will have the highest cigarette taxes in the nation.
(Excerpt) Read more at suntimes.com ...
BTTT
Chicago smokers, shop outside the county and drain the revenue from the city.
The State of Minnesota tacked an additional 75 cents a pack on cigarettes here.
I drive half an hour to Wisconsin now to buy them. While I'm there, I make a point of stopping in at the grocery store to do my week's shopping, as well. There's a nice Home Depot right there, too, when I need some building supplies.
This sort of thing stings states when the main population lives near the border.
The Wisconsin merchants are advertising in the Twin Cities papers, trying to lure Minnesotans to come to Wisconsin to shop.
Silly Minnesota.
one more reason to raise minimum wage. You have to love these Demwits.
Recently, the Chicago City Council also forced Walmart to spend their money to build a new store just outside the city limits.
Therefore, millions of property tax revenue and sale tax revenue per year will not go to Chicago.
I get a carton of Pall Mall 22 bucks..Cheap cigs are 11.75
Let's see...
$3.76 at a Hammond, Ind...
Looks like an opportunity.
Outside the city limits by 1 block!
Note to dealers - Tobacco costs more than pot in some states.
Chicago didn't learn anything from Al Capone and prohibition.
Guess they are trying to get the gangs to move out of trafficing in drugs and get them to traffic in smokes.
Roll your own and stick it to all of the Fed and State blood suckers.
These people wouldn't know economics if it stripped naked and got into bed alongside them.
24,500 Chicagoans applied for 325 jobs at a Wal-Mart opening Friday in south suburban Evergreen Park, one block outside the city limits...
all but 500 listed Chicago addresses...
It's already an opportunity. I live in the neighborhood of Chicago that borders Hammond. The long-term disparity in taxes (cigarettes, gasoline, sales taxes) between Illinois/Cook County/Chicago and Northwest Indiana has destroyed a lot of small business in my part of Chicago. There is no gas station in my neighborhood and the nearest one in Illinois is 4-5 miles away. There are no regular convenience stores in my neighborhood. The ones that do make it also have liquor sales or a delicatessen or Mexican foods. And, if you drive down Burnham Ave. through Calumet City and Lansing, you find the same thing. The only gas stations there also have repair services.
But in Indiana, literally the first thing you see upon crossing the border are gas stations, tobacco shops, all kinds of commerce.
I stopped smoking cigarettes a year ago. I was buying a carton of Pall Malls in Hammond for $23 and some change.
What kind of fool thinks that a person is going to spend three times as much, and over half of it on taxes, for a carton of smokes in Chicago, if they have other options?
The kind of fools who sit on the county board, evidently.
Let's see:
Retail sales price in Cook Cty: $7.59
Cost of $3.76 at a Hammond, Ind...
$ 7.59
-$ 3.76
= Gross profit of: $3.83 per pack.
Discount $1.00 per pack to corner the Market = $2.83 net profit per pack.
Hmmmmm. Need a partner?
"Also, are the tax hikes meant to make people want to quit smoking? If so, I dont really see it working."
That's what they always say, but it's really to get more money for the State.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.