In the event that you're covered by any sort of public health insurance, which is nearly certain in old age with Medicare and increasingly probable at younger ages, then the effects on your own health become a problem for everyone else.
A vile argument. The idea that the state is empowered to curtail people's personal activities simply because the state chose to subsidize the personal health care costs of those activities should be anathema in a free and civilized society.
With that said, high taxes on tobacco products in particular are primarily seen (by proponents and detractors) as means to reduce smoking for general, not exclusively economic, public health reasons.
Tobacco taxes are certainly justified in many different ways, but public health is one of those ways. I'm also reminded of the big settlement the tobacco companies had to pay to all the states about 10-15 years ago, which was justified by the extra expense imposed on Medicare/Medicaid. That wasn't a tax, though it was functionally similar.
I don't think this is true. It only applies when indoors and probably for a very long period of time (ie living with the person, not just being at a restaurant.) Furthermore you can ban public smoking indoors as many places do, that's not the same as a tax.
>In the event that you're covered by any sort of public health insurance, which is nearly certain in old age with Medicare and increasingly probable at younger ages, then the effects on your own health become a problem for everyone else.
This is a problem with public healthcare, not smoking.
To your particular example of being in a restaurant, the increasingly-popular ban on smoking in bars and restaurants was largely driven by the negative health effects on the staff. Though again, I believe the effects on other patrons were non-zero.
>>This is a problem with public healthcare, not smoking. We're agreed there. But getting rid of the public healthcare doesn't seem to be a realistic option at this point.