In the latest development in the nanny state’s war against tobacco, Congress just quietly passed a bill that will raise the smoking age to 21.
This dramatic action caps off a tumultuous year for tobacco policy, with two states and over 280 municipalities now banning the sale of flavored e-cigarettes. Yet, while there has been a notable uptick in vaping among teenagers and young adults in recent years, their use of traditional tobacco products is at a historic low, making the new bill headed to President Trump’s desk that much more perplexing. Raising the smoking age is unnecessary, and it won’t have any major effect on reducing traditional cigarette smoking. It’s just yet another nanny-state scheme to restrict human autonomy.
To see why, just look at the numbers.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “About 6 of every 100 high school students (5.8%) reported in 2019 that they smoked cigarettes in the past 30 days — a decrease from 15.8% in 2011.” That is a drastic drop in less than a decade. Moreover, as I have previously noted for the Washington Examiner, smoking rates have been trending downward for more than two decades, with cigarette use having hit an all-time high at 36.5% of 12th graders in 1997.
Smoking just isn’t cool anymore among young people. If anything, policymakers should be celebrating their triumph. Decades of education, public service announcements, sin taxes, and advertising restrictions have caused a massive drop in teenage tobacco use. Yet the nanny state is never satisfied, so here we are on the eve of yet another ban.
How low does the smoking rate have to go for the statists to be satisfied? Apparently, 5.8% is not low enough for our regulation-happy policymakers. On the margin, the ban may lower the number a bit more, but any sort of significant drop is impossible. At this point, the few teenagers and young adults still drawn to smoking are going to do it one way or another, whether they get their fix from a convenience store or a friend.
This was the case with drinking. As J.D. Tuccille once noted for Reason, the prevalence of underage drinkers dropped a bit after the age was raised to 21 in 1986, but it was by no means the magic fix that policymakers made it out to be:
The same will likely be the case with smoking. We’ll see a slight dip, but nothing worth sacrificing our autonomy — especially for those who put their lives on the line. Just as those under 21 should be able to drink if they’re deemed old enough to die for their country, the same should be true for cigarettes. For the sake of fairness, legal adults should be treated across the board as adults by the government.
Smoking certainly isn’t a healthy habit, but neither are many other recreations in life — drinking, fast food, and even chocolate. I don’t want to live in a world devoid of these guilty pleasures. They’re part of what makes life worth living, and the choice to abstain from gluttony is part of being a functioning adult.
Freedom facilitates moral people. Government control just makes us all minions.
Casey Given (@CaseyJGiven) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is the executive director of Young Voices.
