Tying property taxes to school funding is designed to cause this outcome, it's not a mistake. The majority of US history involves actively harming the poor through policy.

Demand for cigarettes isn’t static. If you make them expensive enough, demand falls. Lower demand means less smoking which means less cancer.

The only real risk with pigouvian taxes is that if you raise them too high, you can foster the development of a black market, which comes with its own set of negative social consequences.

Smokers know the score by now. It's time for society to stop coddling them. Tax their asses to the Moon, call it reparations for all the smog and stentch they subjected the rest of us to for generations.

Iowa : Industrial Agriculture :: West Virginia : Coal

Increasing the price incentivises people not to buy it, econ 101

I think that one's pretty clear cut, people giving themselves cancer are a financial drain on everyone else. Both the supply and demand side should be punished.

Smoking is at historic lows [1] (~10-15%). Screening doesn't stop smoking, poor people will still be poor, smokers will still smoke, although GLP-1s may fix this [2] [3] (certainly, if this proves out, use cigarette taxes to help pay for GLP-1s for everyone to impair the dysfunctional reward center loop). There doesn't seem to be political will to simply ban cigarettes, so here we are. Making cigarettes expensive for poor people who smoke destroys demand, no? Otherwise, we accept the cancer rates for their choice and freedom to smoke knowing the consequences (~5k deaths/year in Iowa from this risk).

[1] https://www.radioiowa.com/2026/01/02/iowa-smokers-can-save-m... (“Increasing the cost of tobacco products is one of the most effective ways to reduce use,” Cale says, “and in turn, to lower Iowa’s lung cancer rates.”)

[2] GLP-1 drugs may fight addiction across every major substance - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47280797 - March 2026

[3] GLP-1 medications get at the heart of addiction: study - https://medicine.washu.edu/news/glp-1-medications-get-at-the... - March 4th, 2026

(i have personal experience with a loved one who will not quit smoking, so I am not unsympathetic to this risk and harm incurred)

That's not a fact. That's just an opinion.

You could just as easily claim, and still be just as opinionated, that a system is what is intended to be (intentional design theory), or that a system should be what it ought to be (normative systems theory), or that a system should evolve to fit the purposes of it's environment (structural functionism), or that there is no fixed purpose and that purpose is instead decided by social consensus (social constructivism).

A motivated reader might notice that the above systems thinking models each align with various schools of thought/philosophical schools. Idealism, telologism, constructivism, etc. This highlights the assertion that there might not be any one correct system of thought given one's stance on Truth, in that certain said systems might believe that they are the One Truth but could not logically demonstrate to the others that they are as such.

I think the closest thing we'd get to purpose for a government is likely defined by the constitution? we're not really even upholding those values

A relative of mine works for a school district in the Chicago area. What should they do? Not take note of people's residence? The whole reason they do is because they used to not. Then people took advantage of it. And the people that take advantage of it typically cause problems for the district. Everything is racist and classist. But wanting a diverse school district to thrive? No that's the real problem. I guarantee Alsip is more diverse than wherever you are writing from. The irony. [0] https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/district.aspx?districtid=...