Shop Owner Fumes Over Impending Tobacco Tax Increase

Fletcher Groben doesn't even know what he'll owe the state in a few days.

"It is very frustrating," he said. "Basically people who don't even understand the business passed a law."

Groben, owner of in Towson, is still trying to sort through the technicalities of tax increases on cigars and smokeless tobacco, passed by the Maryland General Assembly as part of the budget set to take effect July 1.

Non-premium cigars will see a tax increase from 15 percent to 70 percent. Taxes on other tobacco products, such as smokeless and pipe tobacco, will double from 15 to 30 percent.

The tax hike was aimed at curbing youth smoking, particularly small cigars that are often sold individually at convenience stores and available in various flavors. State health officials recently began targeting small cigars with a marketing campaign featuring a sinister ice cream truck.

The tax increase, the first on such products since 1999, could "save thousands of young people from addiction to these deadly products," Vincent DeMarco, president of the Maryland Citizens' Health Initiative, said in a statement on the tax taking effect.

The rub for store owners like Groben is that he's not yet sure what qualifies as a "non-premium cigar." He called it a "gray area" in the bill. He added that a business partner was in touch with state officials trying to sort that out.

Groben said the new tax will achieve activists' aims to curb sales of such products, but not in the way they intended.

"The problem I have with tax increases is, here in Maryland, it's very easy to go over to Delaware and pick stuff up if you want to," he said. "I do think it drives customers away."

You tell us: What do you think about the tobacco tax increase? Do you think it will achieve proponents' aims to curb youth smoking? Tell us in the comments.