have a coke and a smile, comrade
Government monkeywrenching the market.
At $1.51 per pack, Massachusetts cigarette taxes are America's highest. Tattooing in Massachusetts has only recently been legalized. Fireworks are prohibited. Sales taxes are among the highest in the nation. The result is not a tattooless, firework-free society with bursting tax coffers, but instead a bustling business for New Hampshire businesses near the border. Shopkeepers in New Hampshire report cigarette shoppers from as far as New York State on weekends.
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts, rather than lower taxes or legalize sales of fireworks, instead uses its state police to patrol the border with unmarked vans and loiter in New Hampshire liquor store parking lots. Thousands of frustrated former Massachusetts residents have fled the state entirely in favor of greater liberty and lower taxes north of the state border.
In 1987, I spent some time in the USSR. One afternoon, my friend Bob and I were pulled aside by a Soviet police officer. Apparently we were suspicious because we looked foreign and spent too much time chatting with the locals. We were able to avoid further hassle by bribing the cop with a six pack of Coca-Cola. Being a poor country even bribery cost less in Russia than it did in the United States, but in this case the Coke was particularly valuable because it was the "illegal" brand, only available at the shops where foreign guests were allowed. The poor Russians had to suffer with Pepsi, who had secured a government granted monopoly to sell their product to the general population. Unfortunately for the Politburo, Pepsi was not the choice of the Gorbachev Generation and Coke was considered a valuable commodity on the Soviet black market (along with, at the time, Levi's and Norwegian band a-ha cassettes.)
Coca-Cola and fireworks are fairly trivial items, but both the Soviet government and the Massachusetts government respectively chose to prohibit them. However, personal desires for goods and services have always been more persuasive than the law - the failure of 20th century attempts to prohibit alcohol consumption attest to this - particularly when the good or service desired violates the rights of no one. Governments, to the extent which they attempt to prohibit popular desires, undermine all law - including those valuable and necessary laws that mediate disputes between parties or punish the violations of the rights of one individual or group by another. This is a lesson that those who govern learn too rarely. Perhaps they should speak to a New Hampshire tattoo artist or fireworks merchant, who could certainly explain the actual effects of such measures.
11.10.2002 © ljr