On April 1st the large federal taxes on cigarettes went into effect to
add extra money to cover more children in the healthcare program.
In March, Nevada got a 80 cent per pack tax imposed to raise
more revenue. I know taxes have been raised on alcohol, but not
as much as cigarettes.
I live in Las Vegas where a large number of illegal immigrants have
moved in the last few years because of the jobs here. Last Easter
I took my mother to the grocery store to pick up some items she
needed for dinner and because I'm handicapped I waited in the car
while she ran in. While sitting there several hispanic men and families
came out of the store carrying cases of beer. Hardly anything else
in the grocery line and not a six pack but cases. While I had no way of
knowing if they were illegal or not I was pretty shocked because of the
holiday and hoping they weren't going to be driving later after drinking
all that beer. As I sat there more cases were being carried out and I must have counted at least fifty cases of beer in the short time before my mother came out and we left. This goes on everytime I go to the grocery
store. Many pay for their groceries with food stamps but always have
money for alcohol. To bad taxes weren't raised so high on alcohol so they
could not afford it and wouldn't be driving drunk and killing Americans.
Sorry for the rant but it just makes me so mad everytime I think about it.
Hope I didn't offend any smokers or drinkers.