Cheap Smokes

Once again, reality rears its lovely head as the law of unintended consequences conspires with the way the world really works to give the do-gooders a lesson in their own absurdity. Not that they will ever learn that lesson, of course.

On Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal reported, and CNS shared, an interesting development in the world of Big Tobacco: Little Tobacco. Because of the do-gooders, the trial lawyers who use them as stalking horses and their "public interest" lawsuits (pursued "for the children," of course) the wholesale price of the smokes sold by Evil Big Tobacco has increased almost 80% in under 2 1/2 years. This sterling example of successful do-gooderism has naturally led to a big decrease in smoking especially among young people, right?

Wrong.

What has actually happened is that the market has done what the market does. It has seen the unfilled demand for affordable cigarettes and filled it with a supply of just that. Unfettered with the legal bills forced on Evil Big Tobacco a new force has emerged, that of Heroic Little Tobacco.

Perhaps the world would be better off if cigarettes had never been invented. I won’t argue that. But the fact of the matter is that cigarettes do exist and people like smoking them. It is the old story of free market competition with history repeating itself as farce. Being the low cost supplier of a product people want has worked for countless commercial enterprises through the centuries and it will continue to work for countless more in the future. Today it is working for a group of upstarts in the cigarette business who can afford to sell their product for what Big Tobacco used to be able to charge before some smart lawyers and their useful idiots took them to the cleaners. Not having been part of the settlement against the big guys gives the little guys a competitive advantage and they are using that advantage to fill a need and make a buck.

The do-gooders are, of course, surprised and horrified. One of the bureaucrats administering the extortion payoff, I mean legal settlement, is Oklahoma’s Attorney General. He admits to being disturbed by the growth of Heroic Little Tobacco. "They are able to sell a cheaper product, and all of the data show that the price of cigarettes particularly impacts youth smoking," he is quoted as saying. So what has actually happened, as opposed to what they say was intended to happen, is that the do-gooders have enabled more young people to smoke more cigarettes for less money. Nice going.

Think of what this could mean for gun manufacturers if the usual suspects manage to make their unprincipled attack on these legal, useful and immensely enjoyable products stick. The mythical "Saturday Night Special" would pale in comparison. In their quest to protect us from ourselves the do-gooders will hobble the Evil Big Guns and thereby create the Heroic Little Guns. Colt and Sig are getting too pricey for me anyway, so I say bring it on. And imagine how many armamentally deprived gang bangers will be able to afford new firearms!

The possibilities boggle the mind. When they go after all the good fat filled fast food we might even see the return of the 11 cent White Castle hamburger, truly one of life’s bygone joys. So many enjoyable products, so little time. This happy combination of the laws of unintended consequences and supply and demand, lawyers, do-gooders and their good intentions might turn our to be the best thing that ever happened to us. Talk about your unintended consequences.

Grandma always said that the road to Hell was paved with good intentions. I only hope she was right.

May 2, 2001

Ed Cobb [send him mail] is a printer in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley. He is a northerner by birth, a southerner by choice, and a Catholic by the grace of God.

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