Effertz T, Schlittgen R
Institut für Recht der Wirtschaft, Universität Hamburg.
Gesundheitswesen. 2013 Jun;75(6):e95-100. doi: 10.1055/s-0032-1321776. Epub 2012 Aug 29.
Taxes on tobacco products are among the most efficient instruments against tobacco consumption and the arising cost of illness associated with them. The main argument of the tobacco industry against increases of excise taxes on cigarettes is a presumed substitution effect of smokers turning from consumption of legal cigarettes to smuggled ones. Besides deriving this proposition from the tobacco industry's own funded research, it has never been tested empirically. This article analyses the interdependence between contraband cigarettes and cigarette prices in Germany. Using VAR-modelling on the time-series of the variables of interest, we find no empirically valid correlation or causation between prices and untaxed contraband cigarettes. Furthermore, we find a positive relationship between contraband and legal taxed cigarettes, i. e., when the demand for legal cigarettes decreased in amount, so did the quantity of untaxed cigarettes. We conclude that the proposed relationship between prices and smuggled cigarettes as well as an overall substitution effect among smokers is non-existent. This has important implications for public health policy. The proposition that higher taxes on tobacco products incur social costs from increased smuggling activity cannot be corroborated empirically. Furthermore, this finding should encourage public health policy to keep using tobacco taxes as an instrument for prevention.
对烟草制品征税是抵制烟草消费以及由此产生的相关疾病成本的最有效手段之一。烟草行业反对提高卷烟消费税的主要理由是，假定吸烟者会从消费合法卷烟转向消费走私卷烟，从而产生替代效应。除了从烟草行业自行资助的研究中得出这一观点外，该观点从未得到实证检验。本文分析了德国走私卷烟与卷烟价格之间的相互依存关系。通过对相关变量的时间序列进行向量自回归（VAR）建模，我们发现价格与未征税的走私卷烟之间不存在经实证验证的相关性或因果关系。此外，我们发现走私卷烟与合法征税卷烟之间存在正相关关系，即当合法卷烟的需求量下降时，未征税卷烟的数量也会下降。我们得出结论，价格与走私卷烟之间的假定关系以及吸烟者中的总体替代效应并不存在。这对公共卫生政策具有重要意义。关于提高烟草制品税会因走私活动增加而产生社会成本的观点无法得到实证证实。此外，这一发现应鼓励公共卫生政策继续将烟草税用作预防手段。
