Cigarette taxes rose by another 13.7 percent from Monday 1st September 2014.
A pack of 20 increased by $1.12 in excise, and a 40 pack by $2.25. The average pack of 40 will rise to over $30 and many packs of 20 will now be over $20; if this increase is passed on in full. This equates to a cost of around $1 per cigarette for a casual smoker.
There were a series of four increases announced by Labor mid last year and this is the second of those. Further increases are due on the 1st of September for the next two years. Tobacco excise will now also grow in line with wages rather than CPI as it previously did. The changes were expected to discourage smokers away from the habit. The government has reduced it’s budgeted tobacco excise revenue as it expects fewer cigarettes to be sold as people give up the habit.
According to Mike Daube, the president of the Australian Council on Smoking and Health “The latest increase breaches significant price points”. “It’ll cost $7000 a year to smoke a pack a day”. That’s $70,000 over 10 years, and rising.
“We estimate that just as a result of this increase, around 800 million fewer cigarettes will be smoked in Australia and around 60,000 smokers will quit. It's also important that the tax increases are accompanying a great deal of publicity about the harms of smoking and measures such as plain packaging.”
Plain packaging became law in Australia on the 1st of December, 2012. The Health Department’s website shows that sales of tobacco slid downwards by 3.4 percent, from 2012 to last year.
ABS data consistently shows that over the past few years, smokers are gradually kicking the habit.
If you are thinking of giving up the habit – give us a call at Make Changes and ask about how we can help you.
“Hypnosis is the most effective way of giving up smoking, according to documented scientific
comparison of ways of breaking the habit. Willpower, it turns out, counts for very little”
With the aim of finding the most effective method to stop smoking, Frank Schmidt and research student Chockalingham Viswesvaran from the University of Iowa conducted a meta-analysis, statistically combining together the results of more than 600 studies, covering nearly 72,000 people. The results, which were published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, and included 48 studies of hypnosis covering 6000 smokers, clearly showed that hypnosis was three times more effective than Nicotine Replacement Therapy.
What are the most common options to help you stop smoking?
• Hypnotherapy 60% success rate and upwards…
• Acupuncture up to 25% success rate
• Champix (Varenicline) drug up to 22% (side effects common)
• Zyban (Drug) up to 21% success rate (side effects common)
• Nicotine patches up to 13% (side effects common)
• Nicotine Gum up to 11% (side effects common)
• Will Power 5%
(New Scientist Magazine, Vol 136, Issue 1845, 31/10/92, page 6).
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg13618450.700-how-one-in-five-have-given-up-smoking.html