By Jason Schwalm
The Kentucky cigarette tax is currently three cents, the lowest in the nation. Consequently, tobacco farming is often regarded as a best-case scenario for those born into an arduous lifestyle: vocational agriculture. Governor Ernie Fletcher’s proposed cigarette tax increase (34-40 cents), whatever its effects on state revenue, should not only be an issue of a balanced budget, but of the devastating consequences it will bring to a large Kentucky constituency.
Kentucky farmers have already grown accustomed to the short end of the stick. Farming subsidies have shrunk by almost 70 percent in four years, and though tobacco farmers comprise the largest number of subsidy recipients, receiving almost twice that of the next largest group, they receive only one third the total dollar amount. These programs will be gutted again, according to President Bush’s proposed budget, and Fletcher’s tax plan is particularly nefarious in light of this. Nothing says disregard like limiting farmers’ income at the exact time that they are also stripped of possibilities for aid.
Despite our self-proclaimed noble motives — saving our children from the perils of smoking — a 40-cent increase wouldn’t considerably deter young Kentuckians from the purchase of bubble gum, let alone cigarettes. Even if it would, such protection should not come at the expense of other Kentucky families.
Meanwhile, the state congress recently voted to take $27 million from agricultural diversity programs specifically designed to encourage tobacco farmers to pursue other crops. If we’re that interested in eliminating tobacco growth to combat youth smoking, then why is the Kentucky government harpooning one of the only programs that encourages farmers to stop growing the plant in the first place?
With tobacco farmers left with few other options, what’s to stop them from turning to the growth of the other major agricultural product indigenous to our fair state? Goodbye tobacco, hello marijuana. I wonder how Fletcher and his constituency would welcome a conversation about legalization.
After all, legalization would cause a notable increase in the demand for the good, once purchasing carried no risk, and as the mechanisms of the trade of this particular drug would become much less convoluted, entry to the market would no longer be nearly so prohibitive. Kentucky farmers win, Kentucky merchants win, and while Kentucky pot smokers might be disappointed to see an increase in price — due to the rise in demand — surely the availability would counteract such a deterrent. We can just wait 50 years to see what harm this product does, and then face a nation wide lawsuit over that too.
I am not in favor of legalization; a world in which THC ultra 100s are sold at every Speedway is not appealing to me. However, if the state legislature does not begin to look to more inventive measures to bolster revenue than potentially bankrupting a portion of the population, the consequences are, in part, their responsibility.
As tobacco becomes less lucrative to grow, and the funding for transition is simultaneously limited, why shouldn’t Kentucky farmers grow the most similar crop they can, illegal or not? If farmers were to become more likely to apportion a few acres of their land to the growth of marijuana, it would only be done to account for mounting debt and limited aid. And while I completely understand, the DEA probably won’t be so forgiving.
Jason Schwalm is a junior majoring in English and a columnist for The Cardinal. E-mail him at: jschwalm@louisvillecardinal.com
