Playing With Fire: Cigarettes, Taxes and Competition From the Internet / Austan Goolsbee, Michael Lovenheim, Joel B. Slemrod.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Goolsbee, Austan.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Lovenheim, Michael.

Slemrod, Joel B.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w15612.

NBER working paper series no. w15612

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

Playing With Fire

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2009.

Summary:

This paper documents the rise of the Internet as a source of state-tax-free cigarettes and its impact on taxed sales elasticities. Using data on cigarette tax rates, taxable cigarette sales and individual smoking rates by state from 1980 to 2005 merged with data on Internet penetration, the paper documents that there has been a substantial increase in the sensitivity of taxable cigarette sales to state tax rates that is correlated with the rise of Internet usage within states. The estimates imply that the increased sensitivity from cigarette smuggling over the Internet has lessened the revenue generating potential of cigarette tax increases significantly, although states are still far from the revenue-maximizing tax rates.

Notes:

Print version record

December 2009.