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Bloomberg: Alcohol Tax Hike on Tap, Just Not Now
By
John Del Signore
Published Feb 26, 2010
Modified Feb 26, 2010
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By
John Del Signore
Published Feb 26, 2010
Modified Feb 26, 2010
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Asked yesterday about a proposal under consideration by the Health Department to raise taxes on alcohol, Mayor Bloomberg told reporters, "Never say never." But he added, "We do not plan to have that in our budget that we're working on right now." The Health Department gave booze hounds the shakes earlier this week when an official starting talking about "ways to reduce preventable illness and death," such as making alcohol more expensive. But as the Daily News reports today, high booze taxes may have helped make Alaska healthier. The state has the highest beer and wine taxes in the nation, and "saw a 29% drop in alcohol-related deaths when excise taxes were first raised there in 1983." And a second tax hike in 2002 may have contributed to a 11% drop in those deaths. Wow, maybe the government should just bring back Prohibition and eliminate death by 100 percent!
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alcohol tax
John Del Signore
Originally from the Albany area, John Del Signore has called NYC home since 1995. In addition to his thousands of meticulously-crafted bespoke blog posts for Gothamist, his writing has also been published in The Awl, Deadspin, The Nervous Breakdown, and performed at The Brick Theater in Brooklyn.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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