I was on the Irish radio station Today FM yesterday debating with a spokeswoman from the Irish Cancer Society. It appears that the Irish anti-smoking lobby has picked up on an idea that Anna Gilmore came up with three years ago. I wrote about it at the time in a post entitled You Can't Rip Smokers Off, That's Our Job. The gist of Gimore's argument is that the tobacco industry makes 'excessive profits' and therefore (?!) the government should tax cigarettes more.
The Irish government actually makes fourteen times as much money from cigarettes in Ireland than the tobacco industry does, so if we're going to accuse anyone of excessive profiteering I would suggest that the industry comes a very distant second after their venal politicians.
If you want to hear the discussion, it's here from 18 minutes 25 seconds.
