Taxes also have the advantage of being easier to enforce than a ban.

Republican State Comptroller Carole Strayhorn -- who has been a more vicious critic of Perry than any Democrat over the past year -- has attacked the latest plan, saying schools shouldn't be dependent on sin taxes for financing. She also wants to ban topless clubs from even receiving liquor licenses, though that hasn't stopped BYOB establishments from springing up across the state in the past.

The NY Times is such a predictable, biased rag.

I just love "reductions to the most affluent homeowners."

The governor does want to grant property tax relief, yes, but across the board. And a key component of the plan is a cap to stop the appraisal creep that has acted as a MASSIVE tax increase on property owners in Texas in recent years.

The (wonderfully conservative) Harris County tax assessor has the best numbers on the impact of that appraisal creep in recent years, probably the only set of reliable numbers. The state's governor-wannaba Comptroller has nothing comparable, but that doesn't stop her from saying stupid things several times a day. Here's a link to Bettencourt's powerpoint (large):

http://www.hctax.net/downloads/govproptax.ppt

The argument against sin taxes is legitimate, if only that it gives the government a heavy incentive to keep people sinning.

Timothy:

Which requires that you believe taxes don't affect behavior.

"Taxes also have the advantage of being easier to enforce than a ban."

Taxes do affect behavior.

Can you say "Black Market?"

The best thing is for the government to stay out of the nanny-state business.

Jeff:

No, your Mom tells you anything you do is a-ookay. It's your Dad who tells you right and wrong. We're talking Daddy State, not Nanny State. The Nanny State gives you money.

As the man said, "The power to tax is the power to coerce and destroy."
The only bad thing here is that sin taxes delay the starvation of the beast. Voters are more likely to be desensitized to government spending when they perceive that someone else is paying for it. Remember C. Northcote Parkinson's The Law and the Profits? Divide and conquer is Leviathan's stock in trade.

As the man said, "The power to tax is the power to coerce and destroy."
The only bad thing here is that sin taxes delay the starvation of the beast. Voters are more likely to be desensitized to government spending when they perceive that someone else is paying for it. Remember C. Northcote Parkinson's The Law and the Profits? Divide and conquer is Leviathan's stock in trade.

No, no, I'm certain that taxes influence behavior. But that's part of the problem. As taxes are raised on cigarettes, fewer people buy cigarettes. This is a good thing, and so I'm all for sin taxes.

But the result of this is that tax revenues go down, and, tax revenue influencing behavior just as much as paying taxes, the government suddenly has an incentive to keep people puffing away.

So, while sin taxes are good moral policy, you can't make them the backbone of government, because you ought to hope that they eventually stop bringing in any revenue

Another problem with sin taxes is that they make the state a partner in the sin business. This has become explicit with respect to gambling -- thrown your money away on a state lottery recently -- but the ne plus ultra for coopting the state has to be the tobacco settlement. In one shot, the tobacco companies made the state their cartel enforcer and marketing partner. Brilliant.

The states are already complicit--they legalize the stuff so they can tax it indirectly. If you're going to allow sin be honest about it and make it pay.

The term "Nanny State" is from, of all places, Europe.

It speaks of a state which takes over everything, both economically, and morally.

To the extent there should be a sin tax, it should only be enough to cover the externalities of the activity.

Anyone who thinks the government should be in the business of leglislating morality is a statist of the first division.

What's more, you forget the principle of the Conservation of Misery. Like mass and momentum, Misery is always conserved. The profit of virtue is evident only in relation to the cost of sin. When people are left to their own devices, the fools among us will provide clear examples of why not to make foolish decisions.

The alternative is relying on the government to make the decisions for us.

Are you sure you aren't a plant from MoveOn.org?

Every law legislates morality. I want to tax sin. You want it free. I'm anti-sin. You're pro. We each want our moral vision--in your case amoral vision--codified.

No, OJ, I am anti tyranny. I am anti-people who feel they were born to direct other people's lives.

The Jeffersonian marketplace of ideas works far better than the tyranny you have in mind.

If something is truly sinful, engaging in it isn't free, regardless of the tax code.

The NYT is factually wrong again. Maryland has not "shifted part of the cost of schooling from income, sales and property taxes to levies on gambling and nude or topless dances in the last few years." Governor Ehrlich sorely wants slots to pay for the unfunded 15% increase in general fund spending imposed by the General Assembly before the last election, but he hasn't gotten them.

Well, I'll cut the Times a little slack. The GA increased the tobacco tax by $80 million to pay for the first year of the six-year phase-in. It's just the additional $1.22 billion that remains unfunded.

Jefferson didn't believe in a marketplace of morality. The Founders favored liberty within narrow Judeo-Christian boundaries.

"...narrow Judeo-Christian boundaries" is a code phrase for self-professed true believers to exercise their totalitarian tendencies on everyone else.

Where, precisely, within those narrow boundaries is smoking, or drinking alcohol deemed sinful?

Jeff:

All self-destructive behaviors are sinful.

OJ:

Your opinion. I was wondering what divine revelation backed that up. After all, there has to something other than mere human subjectivity to deem something a sin.

Unless you are making it up as you go along.

Pretty basic Thomism.

Your life is not your own to squander. It is ordained to God. Human dignity comes with a price. Yours is protected even from you.

OJ:

That is as may be. Clearly, in this context, what constitutes sin is your own opinion, and not backed up in any way by Scripture.

Which not only seems an awfully subjective way to decide sin, but also nullifies some seriously held religious beliefs (life saving blood transfusions, for one example), while simultaneously bringing the bases for some sainthoods (particularly female saints) into serious question.

I may be a materialist, but I would never go that far.

I was unaware blood transfusions were self-destructive or that any women saints had destroyed themselves.

Blood transfusions aren't self destructive, but their absence can be.

Talk to your Jehovah's Witness friends about that. Or Christian Scientists about declining modern medical care.

I read a fascinating article lately (sadly, I neglected to save the link) regarding the history of some 18th and 19th century female saints.

On their road to canonization, they brutalized themselves into very early deaths. All in the name of religion.