Last month, a new study looking at the results of California's smoking age hike from 18 to 21 in 2016 turns out to be less than meets the eye. The study, looking at BRFSS survey data for 18-20 year olds pre versus post implementation, found that, compared to 21-23 year olds in California and to 18-20 year olds in the eight comparison states, 18-20 year olds did not see any significant change in the rate of decline of current or ever smoking, but did see significantly faster declines in the rates of daily smoking in the three years after the age limit was hiked to 21 versus before implementation. Interestingly, vaping was not examined at all due to apparent data gaps at the time, so this study says absolutely nothing about vaping.
While the part about daily smoking sounds impressive on the surface, one should keep in mind that cigarette taxes were hiked by $2.00/pack in 2016 (effective April 2017), and generally the younger a person is, the more price-sensitive they are since they tend to have less disposable income, and furthermore the earlier they are in the course of their tobacco habits. So it would stand to reason that the tax hike alone, which makes regular and especially daily smoking that much more of an expensive burden on the smoker, would have had a larger impact on 18-20 year olds than 21-23 year olds in California. That would also explain why current or ever smoking (which were essentially not affected at all) would be much less affected than daily smoking as well.
Of note, Pennsylvania had also raised their cigarette tax in 2016 yet still kept their age limit at 18 (until July 2020, that is), yet interestingly that state was NOT one of the eight comparison states. The results of this study would thus likely have been very different if Pennsylvania was one of the comparison states.
Alternatively, some of the progression to daily smoking may simply have been delayed by a few years by the age limit hike, yielding no real long-run benefits, kinda like some studies have strongly suggested about drunk driving deaths when the drinking age was raised to 21. Indeed, by 2019 the daily smoking rate among 21-23 year olds was actually a bit higher than it was in 2016.
And as we have previously noted, in NYC and elsewhere, raising the smoking age to 21 does not seem to actually reduce high school smoking rates compared with keeping it 18, so the "trickle-down" theory that is often used as a specious justification for Tobacco 21 laws is very unlikely to be the case in California (or anywhere else) either.
Thus, this study is more smoke than fire. And regardless, we at Twenty-One Debunked would still oppose the 21 smoking age on principle regardless of its effects. Young adults who are old enough to go to war, be tried as adults, etc. should NOT have the state dictating what otherwise legal substances they choose to put into their own bodies at all, period. Seriously.
And that is a hill we will die on.