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Tobacco Tax Increase

Higher Tobacco Taxes Save Lives

North Carolina has one of the lowest cigarette taxes in the nation.  Let's keep our children from starting to smoke and help adults to quit: Increase North Carolina's Cigarette Tax by $1.00

Raising North Carolina's cigarette excise tax by $1.00 will:
 

  • Reduce smoking among youth by 20% preventing tobacco addiction among 122,900 of North Carolina's youth, saving the lives of 39,300 young people.
  • Reduce smoking among North Carolina adults, helping 73,000 people quit smoking and saving 19,500 adult lives.

Raising North Carolina's tax rates on other tobacco products to the national average will:

  • Reduce tobacco use among youth by almost one-third
  • Reduce overall consumption of other tobacco products by 16%

North Carolina has the 6th lowest cigarette tax in the nation - the national average is $1.41

Raising the cigarette tax by $1.00 will save $31 million from smoking-affected pregnancies and births, $20 million in heart attacks and strokes and an overall $2.9 billion from preventable illness and death. 

Raising North Carolina's tax rates on cigarettes and other tobacco products will generate $428 million per year in new revenue.

Nearly 12,000 North Carolina children will become regular smokers this year, buying more than 25 million packs of cigarettes.  194,000 children alive today will die early from smoking.

Tobacco use costs North Carolinia taxpayers $2.46 billion in direct healthcare costs ($769 million in Medicaid expenses alone) and $3.3 billion in lost productivity annually.

Most North Carolinians don't smoke, but everyone is paying for it.  Taxpayers pay almost $600 a year in state and federal tax burden per year from smoking-caused government expenditures.