How much money is in illegal cigarettes?

[El Presidente]

 

"As the cost of legal tobacco products continues to rise through frequent increases in excise, serious and organised crime groups are taking advantage of the opportunity to make more illicit profits," ACIC CEO Mike Phelan told the ABC.

"The amount of profit organised criminals make on just one container full of cigarettes, means that they only need one out of 30 containers to get through to still make a profit."

 

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-06-18/organised-crime-turning-to-illicit-tobacco-trade-cigarette-price/101158958

[NSXCIGAR]

Cigarettes have been the purview of organized crime since the 1970s. With taxes as high as they are in many states now I can only imagine how much money is in it. NY is what, $12 a pack?

I guess we're never going to figure out if you tax or ban something popular organized crime takes it over. 

[SCgarman]

Seen multiple people busted over the years running thousands of cartons from the Carolinas up into NY to sell on the secondary market. I believe they were 12-14 usd per pack last time we visited Manhattan about 7 or 8 years ago. I wouldn't go again without an armed bodyguard to protect my family and I. That place is outta control with crime now.

[Duxnutz]

Australia must be about $30 a pack by now. 

[KnightsAnole]

I personally haven’t seen it, but, good quality tobacco, that can be used as cigarette tobacco, is still very cheap. In the USA, bulk pipe tobacco is not subject to the 5000% tax that cigarette tobacco is. so, bulk tobacco labelled as ‘pipe tobacco’ is purely to avoid the taxes. The only thing that has historically differentiated the two are blend and shred size. Both come from the same tobacco’s. Cigs are shredded at .8mm-1mm and blended at about 70% bright Virginia mixed with 30% Burley tobaccos. Costs About $20 per pound which makes about 30x packs of 20. Cigs still have huge demand so the black market will be there no matter what.

[westg]

7 minutes ago, Duxnutz said:

Australia must be about $30 a pack by now. 

I talk to cigarette smokers regularly it's about $1.50 to $2 a cigarette in Aus . I don't think 30 notes will hand you a pack of 20's DN 

[NSXCIGAR]

I remember in the 1980s my mother would send me to the store with $5 to get two packs and there would be change left over. I guess with inflation it would be about $7/pack today.

Don't know whether the best thing was the low prices or the fact that a 7 year old could buy cigarettes at the store without an issue. 

[KnightsAnole]

15 minutes ago, NSXCIGAR said:

I remember in the 1980s my mother would send me to the store with $5 to get two packs and there would be change left over. I guess with inflation it would be about $7/pack today.

Don't know whether the best thing was the low prices or the fact that a 7 year old could buy cigarettes at the store without an issue. 

I remember ordering pints of beer at the pub for my uncle and his friend when I was 12 and I got a 1/2 pint of shandy for myself. The general accepted belief at the time being if you can see over the bar you’re old enough to order. Times have changed, I get carded at cvs buying a 6pack now

[Hammer Smokin']

we have cheap native smokes. not sure if they are truly "illegal", as they are grown, manufactured, and sold by the natives. The federal government calls them illegal as they don't get their tax (and we know how the Canadian government needs their taxes), but I've read that it is a billion (with a B ) dollar industry in Canada. 

[Pinkbottles]

1 hour ago, KnightsAnole said:

I personally haven’t seen it, but, good quality tobacco, that can be used as cigarette tobacco, is still very cheap. In the USA, bulk pipe tobacco is not subject to the 5000% tax that cigarette tobacco is. so, bulk tobacco labelled as ‘pipe tobacco’ is purely to avoid the taxes. The only thing that has historically differentiated the two are blend and shred size. Both come from the same tobacco’s. Cigs are shredded at .8mm-1mm and blended at about 70% bright Virginia mixed with 30% Burley tobaccos. Costs About $20 per pound which makes about 30x packs of 20. Cigs still have huge demand so the black market will be there no matter what.

I went to one of those places that you buy the bag of “pipe” tobacco and use their machine to make the cigarettes for a while when I smoked. It would make over a carton in about 3-4 minutes for $20. Better flavor by a long shot and cheaper. 

[KnightsAnole]

3 minutes ago, Pinkbottles said:

I went to one of those places that you buy the bag of “pipe” tobacco and use their machine to make the cigarettes for a while when I smoked. It would make over a carton in about 3-4 minutes for $20. Better flavor by a long shot and cheaper. 

Depending on where you are in the country, it’ll either be in every tobacco shop and gas station or like many places on the coasts -it can’t be found. Midwest it seems more popular. Seems what they are doing is taxing tobacco in ‘cigarette’ form. The same (or better) tobacco, not in cigarette form, isn’t taxed as “cigarettes” and costs Pennie’s on the pound compared to the same tobacco rolled by a factory like Marlboro.

[westg]

[Fuzz AI]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2022-02-22/illicit-tobacco-found-in-south-west-nsw/100850754

More than 250,000 kilograms of illicit tobacco has been found and destroyed in southern New South Wales.

Australian Tax Office (ATO) assistant commissioner Megan Croaker said 9.7 hectares of the crop, weighing the equivalent of 13 bulldozers, had been seized at Koraleigh.

"This was a sophisticated, organised operation," she said.

The tax office said it estimated the government would have missed out on $42 million in excise if it had made its way to smokers.

Officers also seized a picking machine and water pump from the property.

In 2019-20, it was estimated illicit tobacco costs the community $909 million in lost excise revenue each year.

[MrBirdman]

The Tax Foundation estimates that over half the cigarettes consumed in the state of New York are smuggled. That’s a lot of cigs. Even if it they were getting 50 cents on the dollar, you’re talking nine figures a year in revenue.

Safe to say that globally it’s a multi-billion dollar industry.