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Odd couple
Q
I hadn’t realized that the states and big tobacco companies were now in bed together, hoping to keep their market share strong in order to collect big bucks. I guess we still have states supporting tobacco growers with subsidies so people will be employed, smoke, get cancer and die. Then the states can sue the tobacco companies to get money, and the more people smoke, the more money the states get. No wonder governments are incomprehensible. They can be – and are – squarely on both sides of the issue. I tried to explain it to a visitor from Europe but gave up.
A
James A. Klotz responds:
A The states attorneys general and the tobacco companies have been in bed together since the Master Settlement Agreement (MSA) was signed in 1998.
We articulated this in our commentary, “Strange Bedfellows, Good Allies” back in 2003, when Phillip Morris threatened to declare bankruptcy and forego its scheduled MSA payment to the states because of an adverse ruling in the “Mills” class- action lawsuit.
The MSA was actually designed to serve the interests of the tobacco companies and the state governments. And, as you point out, it has.
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