‘I’m a trauma surgeon. I see firsthand what gun violence does to the body.’
The decrease in deaths related to smoking and tobacco use is one of the great public health achievements in California history. With smoking rates declining more than 50% since the 1980s, our policies have been credited with saving 1 million lives and $134 billion in health care costs. A key pillar to this success is an excise tax on the tobacco industry, with revenues used to fund a variety of smoking prevention and cessation programs.
As smoking deaths decline, gun deaths are on the rise in California, and it’s time to borrow from the success of the anti-smoking movement. A bill passed by a supermajority of the California Legislature, AB 28, would do exactly that — place a modest, 11% excise tax on the firearm industry, not consumers, that would generate $160 million annually to fund the expansion of effective gun violence prevention programs. Now it’s on its way to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk.
If even the gun industry can get behind a modest tax on guns and ammo to protect wildlife, then there is no valid argument against doing the same thing to protect human life.
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