NY City Council Votes to Raise Cigarette Purchase Age to 21

[Hissyspit]

Source: NBC New York

City Council Votes to Raise Cigarette Purchase Age to 21

Wednesday, Oct 30, 2013 • Updated 6:10 PM EDT

The City Council has passed a bill to bar anyone under the age of 21 from buying cigarettes and e-cigarettes in New York City.

Under federal law, no one under 18 can buy tobacco anywhere in the country, but some states and localities have raised it to 19.

Some communities, including Needham, Mass., have raised the minimum age to 21, but New York will be the biggest city to do so if Mayor Bloomberg signs the bill, which he is expected to do.

Lawmakers voted 35 to 10 to pass the bill.

Read more: http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Cigarettes-Vote-New-York-Wednesday-229822281.html

[Rebellious Republican]

1. So when are they going to raise the legal age for buying....

Marijuana from 0 to 18, 19 or 21?

[billhicks76]

2. Beyond Messed Up

I hate cigarettes but the government has no business telling people they can't ingest them if they wish. 21???? Really??? You can go off to war to kill people, drive a car, have sex with older people, be tried as an adult, be looked at as an adult for every government program till kingdom come...all at 18 but you have to cede your personal freedom to some guy in the Mayor's office. This gives Democrats a bad name and more nanny-state ammunition to the republicans...stupid, stupid,stupid. And ridiculous too. Stayout o my body and leave me alone.

[Purveyor]

3. +1 eom

[warrant46]

5. Laws like this are used by the Tea Baggers to whip up the sheep

Then the Sheep vote against their own economic interests and for the Koch brothers and their Fascist acolyte RePukes

[alphafemale]

8. The age for alcohol consumption has been 21 for going on 30 years now?

And most people that begin drinking do NOT become alcoholics.

Nearly everyone that starts smoking becomes addicted.

Tobacco companies have made damn sure of that.

If you haven't started smoking by 21 perhaps you will have the good sense to not start.

[SnakeEyes]

10. Because kids follow age limit laws

Raising it two more years is going to really affect a lot.

[alphafemale]

16. Yeah...that people will ignore it so why bother argument.

....yawn


next?

[indepat]

11. Telling an 18-year-old Marine who's just finished boot-camp that he can't legally smoke or

drink is beyond absurd. Sure, he may hurt himself or someone else, but guns on the street are o.k. 'cause the absurd reasoning is that guns don't kill people, people kill people.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

13. It's NYC. Guns are not ok. At least not for the average citizen.

The well-connected, like Donald Trump, can get a permit.

But not some fresh-out-of-boot-camp Marine.

[alphafemale]

15. I think 18 yr olds can drink on base.

At least that used to be the rule.

[jmowreader]

17. It used to be; they changed it in the early 1990s

Now the military obeys the alcohol laws of the location the base is in. Stateside bases require you to be 21; overseas bases, where the drinking age is usually 18, are far different.

[olddad56]

26. I was in the navy in the late 60s, the legal age was whatever it was where you were stationed.

[jmowreader]

27. From 1982 to sometime between 1986 and 1992 it was far different

If you had a military ID card, you could buy alcohol on an active duty base. Some states have national guard bases and on them state law applied.

[billhicks76]

28. Nanny State

That just gives ammo to the Tea Partiers because most of us agree, stay out of our personal lives and bodies. Alcohol is different because the age was raised from 18 to 21 due to all the drunk driving fatalities of innocent people.

[True Blue Door]

4. Age limits on drugs are an interesting topic.

On the one hand, you have to take into account the medical issues - e.g., keeping kids from poisoning themselves while they're still developing. But on the other, you have to account for the psychological backlash that comes from making a given drug "cool" by age-limiting it.

I think the best policies are actually quite a bit different from what they are now, but setting the tobacco age at 21 is a good start. Nicotine is extremely addictive, so it's best to have people be physically mature when they get involved with it.

On the other hand, I think the right approach to alcohol is counterintuitive. Raise the driving age to 17 and then reduce the drinking age to 16, so that they get the partying out of their system before they start driving, and by the time they get to college it's ancient history so they can focus on their work. After all, 16-18 is about when they start drinking anyway, so just have the law reflect reality in a way that reduces harm rather than lives in denial.

Right now they have it backwards, letting kids drive a lot earlier than letting them drink, so what happens is when they start drinking they're not responsible with it but have a driver's license. That's bad. Better they drink irresponsibly and stagger around as pedestrians and THEN learn to drive later when they're figured out how to drink responsibly.

Granted, I don't have kids, so I'm just talking as someone thinking back to my own experiences rather than as a parent, so I understand why this would sound ludicrous to some people. But I think the logic works well.

[billhicks76]

29. You nailed it

Lower the drinking age to 16 and the driving age to 21.

[gopiscrap]

6. good

[onehandle]

7. And add ten bucks to the tax per pack. Cigarettes, like the lottery, are a curse on the poor. nt

Last edited Wed Oct 30, 2013, 07:55 PM - Edit history (1)

[SnakeEyes]

9. So poor people can't choose to live as the please? nt

[bossy22]

14. so poor people should be treated like kids?

Isn't that what you are implying- that they are incapable of making intelligent decisons?

[Bozvotros]

19. And smokers cost society less, not more.

They die earlier and quick. They are taxed out the ass and they die years earlier and quick, saving social security money they contributed and big medicare dollars. It has been studied numerous times in Europe (of course).

Wait. What's that I hear? I hear goose stepping Smoke Nazi's coming right towards this thread. I have got to run.

[onehandle]

23. Those studies never calculate in second hand smoke damage and lost productivity.

This is where you talk about automobile emissions and I point out that unlike cigarettes, cars have a purpose.

[SnakeEyes]

32. Cigarettes have a purpose

They make me feel good and give me something to do that I enjoy.

[hollowdweller]

12. This will create jobs

Poor people who are making min wage can buy cigs and sell them to people already addicted with a slight profit to supplement their poor income.

[Bozvotros]

18. Why is this type of thing the only thing that politicians can do?

Every time I go into a store to buy a six pack of beer or some smokes for my wife, I get carded. At age 61. Because its the law. Because it is a meaningless way to remind people that their politicians are on the job keeping us all safe. Meanwhile heavy toxins, pesticides and herbicides are polluting whole watersheds, half the country is obese, our kids are getting heart disease and diabetes at age 8, our infrastructure is crumbling, there are all these shitty jobs with no benefits,schools are crowded and dangerous, lunatics gun down people with impunity and their response is....... "I know, lets make it harder to get cigarettes".... and "What the hell, lets tax it another buck a pack." The powers that be are also at work trying to stop e-cigarettes because.... well just because. It might be dangerous. There is no proof at all that they are, quite the contrary but by God, we have got to stop this before someone gets hurt. Fuck these assholes. Every goddam one of them.

[The Straight Story]

20. Because we enable them by practically begging them to be anti-choice, which some here love

We want someone to control what others can and cannot do (except on one issue - outside of that issue we run to the leader who promises to force other people to make the choices our 'god' tells us to. Have to save them sinners from their wicked ways).

Some like to live in fear - like the rw of Muslims after 9/11. Take away freedoms to protect us, make us safe, please mr bush and others in government save me from those not like me.

The only difference between some on the left and right when it comes to freedoms? Are which choices they are most anti-about...all the while both sides yelling they are most pro-choice.

[Psephos]

21. great post n/t

[Nanjing to Seoul]

22. At 18, you're old enough to get sentenced to the death penalty. Hell, in some cases, 14 is old

enough. Ask George Stinney.

Thompson v. Oklahoma said 16 is ok to execute.

But now people need to be 21 to buy smokes. Something isn't right.

But this is red meat for the liberal anti-smoking nuts. . .and red meat for the teabaggers too.

When does the nanny state stop???

And I don't smoke, never smoked and hate cigarette smoking.

[Burma Jones]

24. I remember when the age to buy smokes was 16.....We had smoking areas at our High School

I started when I was 12, quit at 36.

I'm 54 and I still get occasional strong urges to light up......

[alcibiades_mystery]

25. My Dad used to send me up to the corner store to buy cigarettes for him when I was 11 years old

Queens, 1980's.

The first pack of cigarettes I ever bought for myself was at that store, and my Dad's brand, so nobody would know! I was 15. I never got proofed for cigarettes in NYC, ever. I never heard of any of my friends being proofed either, and we all smoked at 15 or 16.

Hell, we could walk into most delis and buy a 40oz or a 6-pack. The local liquor store sold us booze when we were 15. This is Queens, late 80's early 90's.

[KamaAina]

30. PATH trains to Jersey City are already full of people looking to shop with lower sales tax

many of them under 21. Why not just pick up a carton or two over there?

[happyslug]

31. Till about 10 years ago, Pennsylvania banned Cigarettes buying by minors, then defined minor at 21.

Two different statutes. When the Federal Right to vote was dropped to age 18 in th early 1970s, many states dropped the age of majority to 18 from 21. Pennsylvania did not, it just dropped its voting age to 18, dropped its laws in regard to Juvenile Law and Children and Youth to be for people under age 18, then added a section that 18-21 year olds will be treated as over 21 for purposes of contract law. Majority remained at 21, but almost everything one could do at 21, you then could do at age 18.

The reason for this was Pennsylvania wanted to retain 21 as the legal age to drink. Pennsylvania NEVER dropped it legal drinking age to below 21. Tobacco was NEVER addressed, the law said simply tobacco could NOT be sold to Minors. Since Pennsylvania NEVER re-defined Minors as people below age 21, that was the law.

Now, since most laws regarding minors had dropped the age of minority to 18, many people ASSUMED that the law as to Tobacco had also dropped to 18. In the late 1990s, several police departments in Western Pennsylvania decided to crack down on underage tobacco buying and arrested retailers who sold tobacco to 18 year olds. The Tobacco lobby said this was illegal, the term "Minor" meant anyone under 18 not 21. The problem was all the Judges who reviewed the law came to the same conclusion, that the age of majority was still 21 for anything NOT expressly stated to be a contract OR had its age requirement expressly dropped to 18.

To avoid "Confusion" the Tobacco lobby then had the State Legislature change the wording to the law from "Minor" to age 18. The members of the State Assembly said they voted for it to avoid confusion, not to change the law to 18. Everyone joked it was a cover, for it was clear that prior to the change it had been age 21, but the age to buy tobacco became age 18.

Just a comment that it is NOT that long ago when age 21 was the law to buy tobacco in at least one state.