Teen Smoking; D. T. Armentano

Roughly three million American juveniles smoke and an additional one million young males use smokeless tobacco. Putting aside (for the moment) all of the other difficulties with the new regulations, can they possibly accomplish their objective? The government proposes severe new re strictions on the advertising of cigarettes under the mistaken assumption that there is a direct relationship between advertising and the decision to begin smoking. But there is little reliable evidence in the literature to support this contention and plenty of evi dence to contradict it. Juvenile smoking actually increased in Fin land after a complete ban on tobacco adver tising was implemented in 1978. Norway, which completely prohibited tobacco adver tising in 1975, has a higher percentage of juvenile smokers than does the United States. And black teens in the United States, pre sumably exposed to the same "persuasive"

advertising as white teens, have far lower smoking rates. It is widely acknowledged (outside of Washington) that the decision to start using tobacco products is influenced primarily by Dr. Armentano is professor emeritus ofeconomics at the University of Hartford. culture, family, and peer pressure, not corpo rate advertising. So banning brand-name event sponsorships, or limiting cigarette brand logos on race cars and drivers' uni forms, will have no measurable effect on any ten-year-old's decision to light up. FDA Commissioner David Kessler would have us believe that billboards near play grounds and the use of cigarette brand names on t-shirts (which would all be prohibited under the new regulations) have created a teen-smoking health epidemic. Nonsense. The marginal increase in teen smoking re corded since 1991 is easily swamped by the longer-term steadily downward trend. Listening to the FDA one would never know that the percentage of high school seniors who smoke daily has fallen from over 28 percent in 1977 to less than 20 percent in 1994. Heavy smoking (half a pack or more per day) among high school seniors had declined from 17.9 percent in 1975 to approximately 11 percent today. Yet the Administration now proposes to restrict tobacco advertising in teen-oriented magazines to a black-and white, text-only format even though there is no evidence that such publishing censorship would impact teen cigarette consumption.

The bottom line is that these new regula tions have little to do with changing cigarette consumption by teenagers. What they will do, however, is hurt certain advertisers, promot ers of sporting events, tobacco manufacturers and their employees, and vending machine 32 owners. Even more importantly, they will enhance the power of government bureau crats to exercise additional control over private markets and lifestyles. And that's what the antismoking crusade is really all about. Make no mistake about it. The FDA would like to severely restrict the sale of all cigarettes in the United States. The Administration knows that total prohibition is politically impractical at the moment so it starts the crusade with regulations that aim to "protect the children." And when these fail, as they must, the regulators will return with stronger recommendations and sterner controls. But controls are already a way of life in this industry. Laws addressing tobacco sales to minors are on the books in every state and the District of Columbia. Dozens of governmen tal agencies, including the Department of GOVERNMENT AND GOVERNANCE 33 Health and Human Services, the Federal Trade Commission, and the Bureau of Alco hol, Tobacco and Firearms, already police and regulate the industry. Every state taxes cigarettes and most lump a sales tax on top of the excise tax. Cigarettes are already among the most taxed and regulated products in America.