Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Smuggling

The new tax on cigarettes have Arkansans driving to neighboring states to purchase their cigarettes. Why not? Missouri is just a short trip up and it has one of the lowest state cigarette tax in the country. Tomorrow the federal government will be raising its cigarette tax by 62 cents per pack across the country. Definitely an incentive to drive to Missouri. Arkansans may legally possess one carton plus one pack of cigarettes that don't have an Arkansas cigarette tax anything more than that is a crime, a Class C felony.
Well, Arkansans need to look on the bright side. Consider Spokane, Washington residents. They are reduced to smuggling dishwater-detergent.
The quest for squeaky-clean dishes has turned some law-abiding people in Spokane into dishwater-detergent smugglers. They are bringing Cascade or Electrasol in from out of state because the eco-friendly varieties required under Washington state law don't work as well.

The environmentally safe detergents just aren't getting the job done. It really is a pain to put dirty dishes in the dishwasher and have them come out dirty. What is particularly disturbing is the fact that this ban may go nation wide. The detergents that work may be banned. What's the point in having a dishwasher when you can't by soap that will work? Then there is the unintended consequences that seems to follow the eco-friendly conversions.
For his part, Beck has taken to washing his dishes on his machine's pots-and-pans cycle, which takes longer and uses five gallons more water. Beck wonders if that isn't as tough on the environment as phosphates. "How much is this really costing us?" Beck said. "Aren't we transferring the environmental consequences to something else?"

Yup, we are so good at creating another bigger problem when trying to solve the first. I wonder if anyone has considered that these eco-friendly soaps failing to clean dishes may lead to an epidemic?

2 comments:

Hardtack said...

When the last tax increase was passed on cigarettes, I knew of several who rolled their own. I knew of others who would drive to one of the Indian tobacco shops to buy.

I guess that there are those in Little Rock that have not realized that when you tax an item, people will buy less of that item. There are many items that are dependent on that cigarette tax, and so what is the legislature going to do when the tax revenues go down?

So, people are hording ammo, next will be cigarettes, and finally dish soap. What will be next?

Craig said...

The 1st item on the Fayetteville vision quest should be action --1 ounce of it is worth more than an ocean of wishing & caring. 2d is to attract profit for businesses with legal workers , not shady dealing, so they will be sold on the potential,3d is to enhance the city so it once more makes the top 5 best places to live.Smuggling phosphate dish detergent reminds me of the 3 flushes it takes to empty a water-saver comode...
The cig tax BB 35 cent a pak AR add-on is to support 'trauma' centers for Delta dimwits who go to Memphis free clinics to have their babies. Little Rock lib elites want to stop reimbursing out of state freecare. I've never even heard of a trauma center, much less feel drawn to one.