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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's

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Speaker 2: Chuck and Jerry's here too, and this is stuff you

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Speaker 2: should Know. I think part of our ongoing corporate mouthfeas.

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Speaker 1: In this edition, Yeah for sure. And the beginning of

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Speaker 1: this episode ties in a lot with we did an

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Speaker 1: episode about the history of the cigarette, sure, like just

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Speaker 1: the thing that you shouldn't put in your mouth, but

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Speaker 1: people do, right, And so we're going to talk a

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Speaker 1: little bit about that here at the beginning, because you

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Speaker 1: need to know a little bit about that as it

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Speaker 1: leads up to what were the you know this lawsuits

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Speaker 1: against big Tobacco. And we should start by saying that

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Speaker 1: it's been a long time that we've known that tobacco

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Speaker 1: and smoking was really bad for you and would kill you.

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Speaker 1: Like the nineteen twenties we knew for sure, the fifties

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Speaker 1: we really really knew. And in the nineteen sixties is

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Speaker 1: when John F. Kennedy finally came out via his Surgeon

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Speaker 1: General Luther Terry, and said, all right, everybody, it's nineteen

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Speaker 1: sixty four. I'm finally going to issue a government report

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Speaker 1: based on you know about a dozen studies with lots

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Speaker 1: of data about a million male smokers, and this stuff

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Speaker 1: is really bad for you. So we're going to have

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Speaker 1: to start putting warning labels on packages.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. The great thing about those warning labels, though, is

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Speaker 2: you were educated to imagine Sammy Davis Junior saying it

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Speaker 2: in your head.

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Speaker 3: That's right.

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Speaker 2: So the cigarette companies this is the beginning of their playbook,

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Speaker 2: and their playbook was basically, nah, yeah, prove it. You

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Speaker 2: can't prove it. This is the whole idea of settled science,

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Speaker 2: the idea that which is just a complete oxymoron, science

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Speaker 2: has never settled. It's a constant, ongoing process. But the

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Speaker 2: idea that you have to have one definitive proof before

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Speaker 2: you can even begin talking about whether something is harmful

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Speaker 2: or not, and really exploiting and manipulating the public through

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Speaker 2: really horrible means, this is where that all started. And

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Speaker 2: the first response that cigarette companies came up with was

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Speaker 2: to say, all right, how about we put filters on cigarettes, Because,

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Speaker 2: as everybody knows, cigarettes make your throat kind of scratchy.

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Speaker 2: Sometimes they can make you hoarse, and that's okay, that's

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Speaker 2: a part of smoking. These new filters are going to

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Speaker 2: help with all of that, and there you go. Cigarettes

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Speaker 2: are healthy everybody.

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Speaker 1: That's right. In the sixties and seventies, that's when we

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Speaker 1: saw lighter cigarettes or low tar cigarettes. In the fifties,

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Speaker 1: they got really sort of organized and official about their

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Speaker 1: PR campaigns. I guess they're propaganda campaigns. When they formed

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Speaker 1: the Tobacco Industry Research Committee under the guise of studying

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Speaker 1: the health hazards of smoking, but it was very much

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Speaker 1: just a PR move. They put out an ad called

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Speaker 1: a Frank Statement the cigarette smokers early on, which said like, hey,

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Speaker 1: we're really like, your health is paramount to us as

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Speaker 1: we sell you cigarettes. It's hard not to laugh because

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Speaker 1: this is just so dumb to think about that people

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Speaker 1: would have bought this.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, but also just so cynical that they would need

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Speaker 2: for sure this too, you know.

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Speaker 1: But they said, all right, we're really going to pledge

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Speaker 1: to research this everyone because we care about your health.

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Speaker 1: But also again, like, you can't really prove that it's

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Speaker 1: just a cigarettes, Like, how do you know that these

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Speaker 1: people dying of lung cancer didn't also get it from

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Speaker 1: all the other stuff that's going on in the world.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And actually that would become kind of codified in

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Speaker 2: what's called the Roper proposal. There was a Tobacco Institute

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Speaker 2: vice president, so in addition to the Tobacco Industry Research Committee,

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Speaker 2: they also came up with the Tobacco and this Institute,

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Speaker 2: and then they renamed the TRC the Council for Tobacco Research.

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Speaker 2: No word of the industry in it, so it's even

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Speaker 2: more trustworthy, right, And Fred Panzer was vice president of

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Speaker 2: the Tobacco Institute, and he wrote a memo in nineteen

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Speaker 2: seventy two that said, essentially, here's what we should do.

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Speaker 2: We need to create doubt about the health charge without

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Speaker 2: actually denying it. And essentially it's a variation on the

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Speaker 2: theme that the case is not proved. And he said,

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Speaker 2: kind of what you were saying that like these are

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Speaker 2: like you can't really prove that it's cigarettes. So for example,

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Speaker 2: extroverts are more likely to smoke cigarettes, but they're also

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Speaker 2: more likely to get out in the world and drop out.

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Speaker 3: Of a heart attack.

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Speaker 2: So maybe it's just that extroverts smoke cigarettes, or that

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Speaker 2: there was one called the constitutional hypothesis that was people

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Speaker 2: who get sick from smoking are biologically predisposed to get

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Speaker 2: sick in general, so it's really them. This was all

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Speaker 2: just thrown about in nineteen seventy two to basically lie

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Speaker 2: to the public and confuse the public about whether or

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Speaker 2: not cigarettes were unhealthy or harmful.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so they're pushing this campaign out behind the scenes.

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Speaker 1: They're just throwing in the back file drawer every study

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Speaker 1: that they had that showed that nicotine was addictive, that

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Speaker 1: smoking was bad for you, Like, they're suppressing that information

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Speaker 1: as well as at the same time targeting children with,

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Speaker 1: you know, product placement in movies, specifically Superman two in

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Speaker 1: nineteen eighty one with Marlborough. Obviously we've talked about camel

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Speaker 1: Joe before in the history of the cigarette. That was

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Speaker 1: what I say, cammel Joe. Yeah, I like camel Joe. Okay,

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Speaker 1: I think we should leave all this in there except

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Speaker 1: the beep, although there's plenty of those episodes.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, let's get the beep out.

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Speaker 1: So that was in nineteen eighty eight. I like camel Joe.

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Speaker 3: I like so called you.

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Speaker 1: I always called them camel Joe. I didn't know that

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Speaker 1: wasn't the name.

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Speaker 2: I'm sure there's some retired tobacco industry guy who was like, man,

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Speaker 2: we should have called him Camel Joe. That is way better.

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Speaker 1: Here's a gen X stat for you, which is fairly

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Speaker 1: staggering but completely believable. Youth smoking, like kids and teenager smoking,

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Speaker 1: had been on the decline kind of through the seventies

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Speaker 1: and eighties for the most part, and then in the

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Speaker 1: nineties when gen X came around to like prime smoking age,

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Speaker 1: it really jumped. It hit an all time high in

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Speaker 1: nineteen ninety seven of thirty six point four percent of

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Speaker 1: youth were smoking. Adults were smoking at twenty four point

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Speaker 1: seven percent at the time, and that's just a staggering number.

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Speaker 1: I think it's at like three point something percent now.

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Speaker 1: So gen xers were smoking at a rate of thirty

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Speaker 1: six percent.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: And there's two things that they suggest had to do

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Speaker 2: with that huge jump in youth smoking. One was this

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Speaker 2: big campaign and push to target youth smokers. The tobacco

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Speaker 2: industry called them replacement smokers. They would replace the other

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Speaker 2: lifelong smokers that died off from smoking, right. And that's

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Speaker 2: the thing too, is like one of the things about smoking,

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Speaker 2: very few people start smoking as adults. We call them

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Speaker 2: total morons. Most people who smoke started smoking in adolescents.

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Speaker 2: So the tobacco industry had every incentive to go after kids.

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Speaker 2: They just knew that society would not allow them to

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Speaker 2: do that if they did it overtly, so they had

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Speaker 2: to do it, you know, kind of under the radar

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Speaker 2: with Camel Joe. The other thing is that there was

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Speaker 2: a price war that started in the mid nineties, and

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Speaker 2: that they think that the drop in the price of cigarettes, Yeah,

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Speaker 2: made it more likely for younger kids to smoke, because

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Speaker 2: younger kids are more price sensitive than older people who

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Speaker 2: are smokers.

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Speaker 1: Remember how cheap cigarettes were back then. Yeah, it's like

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Speaker 1: a buck buck twenty five a pack or something for sure. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I mean I wasn't a regular smoker. I occasionally smoked,

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Speaker 1: as we talked about before, So I wasn't like buying packs,

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Speaker 1: but I sold them at the Golden Pantry in Athens,

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Speaker 1: Georgia on the East Side. And cigarettes were cheap, and

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Speaker 1: they're somebody told me the day that they were like

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Speaker 1: twelve to fifteen dollars in like twenty something bucks in

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Speaker 1: New York a pack.

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Speaker 2: I believe that. I totally believe that.

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Speaker 1: Oly. Well, we'll see why here in a minute.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, one of the other things too, that they're

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Speaker 2: doing at the same time, besides suppressing studies sewing doubt

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Speaker 2: and confusion among the public about the harm of cigarettes,

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Speaker 2: they're just out and out denying publicly that not only

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Speaker 2: your cigarettes not harmful, they're not even addictive. That as

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Speaker 2: recently as nineteen ninety four, Yeah, they were publicly saying,

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Speaker 2: like the head of Philip Morris was saying in interviews,

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Speaker 2: we do not believe cigarettes are addictive. In the nineties,

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Speaker 2: people had known, like all you had to do is

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Speaker 2: ask a smoker back in fifties if they were addicted

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Speaker 2: to cigarettes, and they could tell you that they probably were.

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Speaker 2: And like this, the industry in the nineties still wouldn't

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Speaker 2: fess up to that. Like that was their tactic. Just

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Speaker 2: a complete solid wall with zero cracks in it, over

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Speaker 2: and over again being reinforced publicly.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Actually, in the nineteen fifties, I think they probably said, like, no,

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Speaker 1: I don't think they're addicted, but do you have a cigarette?

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Speaker 1: Can I have a cigarette?

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Speaker 3: Right?

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Speaker 1: I see a guy where they're smoking, you think he

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Speaker 1: has an extra cigarette for me?

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Speaker 3: Right?

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Speaker 1: All right? So in the nineteen fifties, we need to

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Speaker 1: start with sort of lawsuit talk. There were a lot

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Speaker 1: of lawsuits all unsuccessful. By the mid nineties, when they

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Speaker 1: were still saying that it wasn't addictive, there were at

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Speaker 1: least four hundred lawsuits that they never lost, they never settled.

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Speaker 1: They had one hundred percent record.

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Speaker 3: That's crazy, which is.

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Speaker 1: Staggering to learn. They had obviously a ton of money

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Speaker 1: to form like the best legal representation they could, but

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Speaker 1: they were also actively low being state governments about making

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Speaker 1: it harder to sue about tort reform because like, hey,

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Speaker 1: tobacco's a natural product, so cigarettes fall into that category,

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Speaker 1: like despite all the other stuff that's in there, so

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Speaker 1: you can't sue somebody for packaging a natural thing and

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Speaker 1: selling it to people.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: That was the other thing they were doing, too, is

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Speaker 2: they were really lobbying government really effectively.

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Speaker 3: Like they spent a lot of money on.

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Speaker 1: Lobbyists, right, not like now.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, they were like the teflon down of industries.

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Speaker 3: I guess, yeah, tobacco industry.

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Speaker 2: Was what did you just say, not like now, because

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Speaker 2: I picked up like atastic, Yeah, what were you mentioning?

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Speaker 1: I'm sure they're still pouring tons of money into the lobby.

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Speaker 2: Oh sure, sure, yeah, I'm sure too. But so they

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Speaker 2: were they were just completely untouchable, Like, I mean, if

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Speaker 2: you have one hundred percent record, that in and of

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Speaker 2: it self will prevent people from filing suit against you.

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Speaker 1: Right, yeah, because it's expensive, it is, right.

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Speaker 2: And you're just like, I'm not gonna win, or the

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Speaker 2: chances of me winning are so low, I might not

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Speaker 2: even file suit. So the state also, we should mention

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Speaker 2: Congress is doing almost nothing about this at this point.

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Speaker 2: So the state attorneys general, William Safire just smiled from heaven.

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Speaker 2: Led by a guy named Michael Moore, he was the

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Speaker 2: attorney general from Mississippi. They got together and they said, well,

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Speaker 2: if the federal government's I can't do anything about it,

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Speaker 2: we're going to Yeah, and one state might not be

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Speaker 2: able to take on the tobacco industry, but every state,

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Speaker 2: territory and DC together definitely can take on the tobacco industry.

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Speaker 2: Not only can we take them on, we can seriously

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Speaker 2: threaten to bankrupt the entire tobacco industry right out of

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Speaker 2: existence if we really try.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and they play their cards right, because they were like,

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Speaker 1: how can we best go at them? Maybe medicaid is

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Speaker 1: the way to do it, because we have these medicaid

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Speaker 1: programs through our individual states that are not going bankrupt,

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Speaker 1: but they're they're in bad shape in a lot of

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Speaker 1: cases because they're treating all these smokers who are really

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Speaker 1: expensive to get through, like you know, lung cancer treatment,

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Speaker 1: and they have deceived us for all these years. So

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Speaker 1: let's go after him for RICO status like fraud and racketeering.

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Speaker 1: And that'll send a shiver even through the spine of

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Speaker 1: a teflon don. And they were turning up, like Livia says,

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Speaker 1: like literal truckloads of documents from the industry about them

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Speaker 1: selling to teenagers, bearing studies covering up what they knew

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Speaker 1: about how addictive everything was. And there were I mean,

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Speaker 1: this would be a good sort of thriller movie, almost

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Speaker 1: like a Soderberg kind of thing. You probably do a

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Speaker 1: great job with it. Where like they're racing like documents

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Speaker 1: out of offices while they're trying to actively like bury

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Speaker 1: these documents, Like I think the guy from Texas was

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Speaker 1: literally trying to put papers on a private jet so

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Speaker 1: they could be taken to a district judge before the

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Speaker 1: state court could seal them up because once the Feds

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Speaker 1: are investigating, it can't be sealed at the state.

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Speaker 2: Level, right or even if they do steal it at

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Speaker 2: the state level. This federal district judge is like, that

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Speaker 2: doesn't apply to me, so I can I can make

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Speaker 2: these public are part of a court case, right, So yeah,

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Speaker 2: I mean yeah, that is like a thriller. And there

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Speaker 2: is something that kind of touched on this. It was

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Speaker 2: the Insider with who is the Australian actor he used

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Speaker 2: to get in fights all the time?

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Speaker 1: Russell Crowe?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, Russell Crowe is Jeffrey Wiggand I think yeah, who

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Speaker 2: was like this whistleblower a movie back on Industry?

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Speaker 3: It was great.

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Speaker 2: I think that was a Michael Man movie.

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Speaker 1: Michael Mann, Man, I nailed it. You should nailing all

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Speaker 1: of it.

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Speaker 2: I should be a guest on movie Crush.

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Speaker 1: Oh man, if only.

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Speaker 2: But one of the other things you kind of touched

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Speaker 2: on their strategy, like the focusing on lying to the

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Speaker 2: public and targeting teens. That was a really smart strategy

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Speaker 2: because if they were just like cigarettes are harmful and

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Speaker 2: we need to get rid of them, a lot of

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Speaker 2: adults are like, you don't need to tell me whether

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Speaker 2: I should smoke or not. I can kill myself if

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Speaker 2: I want to. So they left that part alone and

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Speaker 2: they went after the fact that they were targeting teens

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Speaker 2: and lying to the public, because the public sentiment can

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Speaker 2: get behind those two things like yeah, kids are out

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Speaker 2: of bounds, we don't want them smoking, and you know

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Speaker 2: we were lied to all these years by these same people. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: go get them. So that was a really smart strategy

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Speaker 2: that these attorneys general like took on, like it was amazing,

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Speaker 2: an amazing court angle, I think is what they call them,

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Speaker 2: what a court angle?

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Speaker 1: Look at that, Yeah, for sure. And the writing was

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Speaker 1: on the wall for investors because we're talking about hundreds

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Speaker 1: of billions of dollars at stake, and they were like, hey,

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Speaker 1: this is this is going to look really bad and

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Speaker 1: our stock prices are going to really go in the tank.

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Speaker 1: And so you got to cut a deal here, which

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Speaker 1: the tobacco company never had thought about, you know, because

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Speaker 1: they had not only lost, never lost, they never settled anything.

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Speaker 1: So finally in April of ninety seven, they were set

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Speaker 1: to go to trial in a few months and they're like,

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Speaker 1: all right, let's get a meeting set up with this

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Speaker 1: Michael Moore character from Mississippi, not the movie guy obviously,

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Speaker 1: and an attorney for Tobacco Free Kids who was working

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Speaker 1: with the States about all the marketing toward you know,

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Speaker 1: kids with Joe, Cammel Joe and everybody. So they started negotiating, like,

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Speaker 1: all right, out of the gate, let's just say we'll

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Speaker 1: get rid of Camel Joe. We love him, kids love him,

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Speaker 1: but we'll get rid of him and the marble or

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Speaker 1: man if that makes you happy. And then a few

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Speaker 1: months later in June, they said, all right, we got

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Speaker 1: to start talking, like hash out the money part. So

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Speaker 1: how does three hundred and sixty eight and a half

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Speaker 1: billion dollars sound over twenty five years as just an

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Speaker 1: opening salvo?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And the States were like, I was not expecting

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Speaker 2: that actually, but they so they were like, okay, here's

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Speaker 2: the problem though, These are like we need to bring

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Speaker 2: the Feds in, like that Congress has to approve of

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Speaker 2: this deal the way that we've set it up. And

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Speaker 2: there were some federal aspects to it. One was that

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Speaker 2: the FDA would start regulating tobacco products. Another one was

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Speaker 2: that the companies, these tobacco companies would be protected against

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Speaker 2: any further civil and class action lawsuits.

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Speaker 1: This is the big one.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, Yeah.

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Speaker 2: In exchange, they would create a fund to pay some

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Speaker 2: of those people off, and then there would also be

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Speaker 2: federal restrictions on indoor smoking. And this did not go

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Speaker 2: very far because of that protection of the companies.

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Speaker 1: Right, yeah, I mean that was the sticking point. I

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Speaker 1: think they could have not too happily lived with the

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Speaker 1: rest of it, but that was a big one as

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Speaker 1: far as Congress, and soon enough the American people were like,

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Speaker 1: uh uh, we can't have that. No, So Congress had

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Speaker 1: a build to ratify or at least considering a bill

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Speaker 1: to ratify it, Universal Tobacco Settlement Act S fourteen fourteen.

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Speaker 1: They were debating it, all this disclosure comes out and

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Speaker 1: they're like, man, they were really awful companies and it's

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Speaker 1: worse than we thought even and the idea of them

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Speaker 1: being protected moving forward, like is it going to fly?

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Speaker 1: So the late Senator John McCain said, all right, how

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Speaker 1: about S fourteen fifteen where there's more money, like had

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Speaker 1: this five hundred and twenty billion sound and we're not

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Speaker 1: going to protect you from now on like you you

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Speaker 1: can be sued moving forward too.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: The industry lobbied like they've never lobbied before to keep

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Speaker 2: this from getting passed through. And again you mentioned the

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Speaker 2: stock prices when all these stuff, the stuff is going on,

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Speaker 2: their stocks are tanking. When you know there would be

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Speaker 2: a win for in the negotiations for the tobacco companies,

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Speaker 2: their stock prices would go back up. It's all very cynical.

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Speaker 2: And this stock price went back up after McCain's bill

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Speaker 2: did not get passed. And one of the reasons it

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Speaker 2: wasn't passed is because other senators added like riders that

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Speaker 2: had nothing to do with tobacco, and I'm guessing unpopular writers,

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Speaker 2: probably at the behest of the tobacco companies. I could

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Speaker 2: not find the writers to save my life, to basically

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Speaker 2: sink this bill. You know, like, imagine if you had

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Speaker 2: this great bill and then somebody's like, I'm also adding

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Speaker 2: a rider to repeal the requirement for child sexual predators

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Speaker 2: from having to register and they can live by schools. Now,

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Speaker 2: your bill's not going to pass. And I get the

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Speaker 2: impression that that's kind of what happened to McCain's bill.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure, there was another thing we just sort

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Speaker 1: of should mention in passing at least, so it was

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Speaker 1: another suit in October of ninety seven. This is why

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Speaker 1: they're debating these original bills in Congress where they did settle.

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Speaker 1: It was a separate class action suit that was filed

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Speaker 1: ninety one by flight attendants in the United States saying like, hey,

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Speaker 1: smoking sections and planes are like killing us and it's

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Speaker 1: pretty awful. So it was a husband and wife team

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Speaker 1: named Stanley and Susan Rosenblatt who filed this one, and

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Speaker 1: they ended up settling for three hundred million dollars to

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Speaker 1: fund medical research. And they said this was a big

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Speaker 1: sort of turning point, and that's the first time they

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Speaker 1: officially caved. And again this is while they're debating these

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Speaker 1: bills in the Congress.

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Speaker 2: Right, Chuck, I feel like we set things up pretty

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Speaker 2: well for a break, Like we deserve an.

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Speaker 1: Ad we deserve a break today.

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Speaker 4: Let's do it, okay, Okay.

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Speaker 2: So things are just kind of not going quite well

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Speaker 2: because the whole thing was handed over from the states

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Speaker 2: to Congress, and Congress just fumbled it.

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Speaker 3: As they do.

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Speaker 2: So some of the states went on and we're like,

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Speaker 2: we're gonna just keep going and negotiating our own agreements

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Speaker 2: with the tobacco companies Florida, Minnesota, Mississippi, who had led

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Speaker 2: the charge originally in the first place, and Texas. They

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Speaker 2: all came up with their own settlements and like pretty

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Speaker 2: eye popping amounts, Texas got more than seventeen and a

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Speaker 2: half billion dollars out of their agreement. Minnesota got a

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Speaker 2: nice chunk of change. But they also had the foresight

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Speaker 2: to say, not only are you going to settle with money,

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Speaker 2: part of this is that you have to disclose public records.

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Speaker 2: All internal documents that are part of discovery in this

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Speaker 2: process are going to be made public after this, and

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Speaker 2: the tobacco companies had to agree with that. So that

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Speaker 2: was where a lot of these disclosures came from. That

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Speaker 2: they had just been lying, lying, lying, because these troves

383
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Speaker 2: of documents that came up in discovery during these cases,

384
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Speaker 2: just journalists went crazy. It was like a feeding frenzy

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Speaker 2: on them.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, for sure. They saw the writing on the

387
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Speaker 1: wall once again. So they got together with the other

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Speaker 1: remaining states who were all plaintiffs at this point in

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Speaker 1: November of nineteen ninety eight and agreed to what would

390
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Speaker 1: end up being the Tabasco Tabasco, the Tobacco Oh man,

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Speaker 1: the Tabasco Settlement. Can you imagine the numbers? The Tobacco

392
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Speaker 1: Master Settlement Agreement, the MSA, which would include two hundred

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Speaker 1: and six billion dollars paid out over twenty five years

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Speaker 1: to forty six states, five territories in DC. Yeah, and

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Speaker 1: they would allocate it according to like how many smokers

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Speaker 1: they estimated each state had and how much It was

397
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Speaker 1: still based on the medicaid thing, so how much they had,

398
00:22:09,760 --> 00:22:12,040
Speaker 1: you know, had to pay out and Medicaid for all

399
00:22:12,040 --> 00:22:16,200
Speaker 1: these related costs. They said, Well, also stop targeting miners,

400
00:22:16,240 --> 00:22:18,720
Speaker 1: even though they really like to smoke, as it turns out,

401
00:22:19,080 --> 00:22:23,200
Speaker 1: and they love cartoon camels, So no more cartoon characters

402
00:22:23,200 --> 00:22:26,440
Speaker 1: and our ads. We're not going to give away free

403
00:22:26,480 --> 00:22:32,400
Speaker 1: cigarettes to miners at recess, which is crazy. We are

404
00:22:32,440 --> 00:22:36,200
Speaker 1: going to shut down these you know, sort of shell

405
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Speaker 1: research companies that are really just PR firms for US,

406
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Speaker 1: dissolving those We're going to release all these documents, and

407
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Speaker 1: we're going to create a national foundation to address underage

408
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Speaker 1: tobacco use and addiction. And we promised to care this time.

409
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Speaker 2: Yeah, we're a newer, gentler loving tobacco company.

410
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Speaker 1: That's right.

411
00:22:57,880 --> 00:23:00,639
Speaker 2: They also created what's now known as the Truth Initiative,

412
00:23:00,840 --> 00:23:04,879
Speaker 2: which is this whole teen anti smoking campaign that was

413
00:23:05,000 --> 00:23:07,600
Speaker 2: funded originally by the tobacco companies.

414
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Speaker 1: Those commercials were great.

415
00:23:09,280 --> 00:23:11,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're still around. The Truth Initiative is they seem

416
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Speaker 2: to have migrated online.

417
00:23:13,359 --> 00:23:14,440
Speaker 1: Surprisingly, Yeah, I'm sure.

418
00:23:14,800 --> 00:23:16,720
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess that's where kids are these days

419
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Speaker 2: or something.

420
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Speaker 1: That's where the kids are.

421
00:23:18,960 --> 00:23:22,320
Speaker 2: And so initially this agreement was just before or between

422
00:23:22,600 --> 00:23:26,119
Speaker 2: these forty six states and territories in DC and the

423
00:23:26,240 --> 00:23:31,199
Speaker 2: four largest tobacco companies which represented the vast majority of

424
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Speaker 2: the market share of the tobacco industry in the United States,

425
00:23:34,680 --> 00:23:38,879
Speaker 2: Philip Morris, R. J. Reynolds, Brown and Williamson and Laurellard.

426
00:23:39,400 --> 00:23:40,760
Speaker 1: I'd only heard of two of those.

427
00:23:41,840 --> 00:23:44,720
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure, I've heard of the other ones, but

428
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Speaker 2: I cannot tell you what they make.

429
00:23:46,880 --> 00:23:48,919
Speaker 1: Okay, Yeah, no idea, let's just leave it at that.

430
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Speaker 1: Maybe they make a Bucks I remember, Yeah, I remember.

431
00:23:52,920 --> 00:23:55,200
Speaker 1: I think we talked about Bucks in the cigarettes episodes

432
00:23:55,320 --> 00:23:58,439
Speaker 1: were at the Golden Pantry. Those were the Those are

433
00:23:58,440 --> 00:24:00,520
Speaker 1: the ones that I think the rumor was, at least

434
00:24:00,560 --> 00:24:03,480
Speaker 1: they were just made from the sweepings, the trimmings and

435
00:24:03,600 --> 00:24:06,760
Speaker 1: sweepings up of factories. They would just package them as Bucks.

436
00:24:06,800 --> 00:24:09,240
Speaker 2: I'm quite sure that that is true to some degree.

437
00:24:09,280 --> 00:24:12,040
Speaker 2: There's a kernel of truth in there, and there's probably

438
00:24:12,119 --> 00:24:13,800
Speaker 2: kernels of something in those buck.

439
00:24:13,600 --> 00:24:15,800
Speaker 3: Cigarettes just about to say that.

440
00:24:17,040 --> 00:24:20,000
Speaker 2: So a bunch of manufacturers were like, we don't need

441
00:24:20,040 --> 00:24:22,560
Speaker 2: to take part in this. We didn't do that much damage.

442
00:24:22,680 --> 00:24:26,880
Speaker 2: They're called non participating manufacturers. They were typically smaller players.

443
00:24:27,400 --> 00:24:28,920
Speaker 2: I mean, if you weren't one of the big four,

444
00:24:28,960 --> 00:24:31,840
Speaker 2: you were basically by definition, one of the smaller players.

445
00:24:32,280 --> 00:24:34,640
Speaker 2: But the States are like, not so fast. You still

446
00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:38,240
Speaker 2: are going to have to pay money to us for

447
00:24:38,359 --> 00:24:42,359
Speaker 2: each cigarette that you sell. And those smaller players, most

448
00:24:42,359 --> 00:24:45,200
Speaker 2: of them were like, well, maybe we'll sign this master

449
00:24:45,320 --> 00:24:48,320
Speaker 2: settlement after all the mask So they really lasted, like

450
00:24:48,359 --> 00:24:52,840
Speaker 2: a lot of tobacco manufacturers into this, this whole agreement.

451
00:24:53,920 --> 00:24:57,720
Speaker 1: Yeah, if you're wondering about DIP, they had a different agreement,

452
00:24:57,800 --> 00:24:59,960
Speaker 1: but it was still an agreement kind of under the

453
00:25:00,080 --> 00:25:04,440
Speaker 1: spanner with US Tobacco Company, which makes Skull and Copenhagen.

454
00:25:05,680 --> 00:25:07,040
Speaker 1: Did you ever dip at all?

455
00:25:07,320 --> 00:25:08,240
Speaker 3: Yes? I did.

456
00:25:08,680 --> 00:25:11,439
Speaker 2: One thing I never really did was chew. That was

457
00:25:12,280 --> 00:25:14,320
Speaker 2: I tried it once and turned as green as you

458
00:25:14,359 --> 00:25:14,760
Speaker 2: can get.

459
00:25:15,640 --> 00:25:18,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, I chewed tobacco early on. We might have spoken

460
00:25:18,600 --> 00:25:21,320
Speaker 1: about this when I was a youth group member at

461
00:25:21,320 --> 00:25:24,440
Speaker 1: my church. It was pretty popular. So I chewed like

462
00:25:24,520 --> 00:25:27,840
Speaker 1: Redman and Levi Garrett occasionally and then here and there.

463
00:25:28,040 --> 00:25:31,080
Speaker 1: In college, I would dip with friends who dipped, but

464
00:25:31,160 --> 00:25:34,159
Speaker 1: it never, like all nicotine never got its hooks and

465
00:25:34,240 --> 00:25:35,240
Speaker 1: me thankfully.

466
00:25:34,920 --> 00:25:37,680
Speaker 2: Oh that is thankful, for sure, because once it does,

467
00:25:37,720 --> 00:25:38,840
Speaker 2: it's hard to get rid of.

468
00:25:39,040 --> 00:25:42,120
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. But one difference with the dip companies

469
00:25:42,320 --> 00:25:44,720
Speaker 1: is they were given out and I remember this is

470
00:25:44,760 --> 00:25:47,400
Speaker 1: a big deal. They used to just give out reams

471
00:25:47,640 --> 00:25:52,600
Speaker 1: of dip to minor league baseball and major league baseball.

472
00:25:52,600 --> 00:25:55,600
Speaker 1: That's why baseball was and other sports too, but baseball

473
00:25:55,640 --> 00:25:57,760
Speaker 1: was always associated with dipping. But they were like, you

474
00:25:57,800 --> 00:26:00,639
Speaker 1: can't give this stuff away to like high school and

475
00:26:00,680 --> 00:26:03,520
Speaker 1: college baseball teams anymore. In minor league baseball teams.

476
00:26:03,359 --> 00:26:05,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think any sports team because like kids look

477
00:26:05,920 --> 00:26:07,639
Speaker 2: up to them, right, which is a big part of

478
00:26:07,680 --> 00:26:11,600
Speaker 2: why they were doing this. So the sunflower seed companies.

479
00:26:11,720 --> 00:26:13,720
Speaker 1: Rejoiced, oh for sure.

480
00:26:14,359 --> 00:26:15,640
Speaker 3: So there was.

481
00:26:15,680 --> 00:26:19,520
Speaker 2: Another thing that came up that was fairly unpopular. But

482
00:26:19,720 --> 00:26:24,560
Speaker 2: also I think people were just kind of what's not ambivalent,

483
00:26:24,600 --> 00:26:26,600
Speaker 2: but where you're of two minds and you're kind of

484
00:26:26,640 --> 00:26:31,719
Speaker 2: tussling over it internally, Yeah, the internal tussley we'll call it.

485
00:26:32,680 --> 00:26:37,160
Speaker 2: Five point one five billion dollars went to the National

486
00:26:37,200 --> 00:26:43,760
Speaker 2: Tobacco Growers Settlement Trust Fund to compensate tobacco farmers because

487
00:26:43,800 --> 00:26:48,159
Speaker 2: they were going to sell a lot less tobacco.

488
00:26:48,200 --> 00:26:48,840
Speaker 3: Because of this.

489
00:26:49,200 --> 00:26:51,800
Speaker 1: And it's interesting to think about.

490
00:26:51,720 --> 00:26:53,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, because you're like, on the one hand, like, who cares,

491
00:26:53,800 --> 00:26:55,600
Speaker 2: it's tobacco, and then on the other hand, you're like,

492
00:26:55,640 --> 00:26:58,520
Speaker 2: these are often family farmers who have been doing this

493
00:26:58,560 --> 00:27:01,480
Speaker 2: for generation. So I kind of to yeah, I'm tussling

494
00:27:01,520 --> 00:27:02,480
Speaker 2: internally over it.

495
00:27:03,840 --> 00:27:09,000
Speaker 1: What word is it? I know what you're talking about. Yeah,

496
00:27:09,080 --> 00:27:10,920
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know somewhere right.

497
00:27:10,880 --> 00:27:13,040
Speaker 2: In And then one other thing about this too that

498
00:27:13,160 --> 00:27:15,240
Speaker 2: was part of the provision was people were like, well,

499
00:27:15,240 --> 00:27:18,080
Speaker 2: what about the federal government because Medicaid is this joint

500
00:27:18,200 --> 00:27:22,000
Speaker 2: state federal partnership and the feds fund a lot of this,

501
00:27:22,080 --> 00:27:24,239
Speaker 2: And the Feds were like, no, we're leaving ourselves out.

502
00:27:24,240 --> 00:27:26,280
Speaker 2: We're waiving any right to any of that money. This

503
00:27:26,400 --> 00:27:28,880
Speaker 2: was the state's game, and they did a great job

504
00:27:28,920 --> 00:27:29,280
Speaker 2: with it.

505
00:27:30,520 --> 00:27:34,439
Speaker 1: Yeah, a lot of public health officials were like not

506
00:27:34,560 --> 00:27:37,480
Speaker 1: super happy about that because they were like, hey, listen,

507
00:27:37,560 --> 00:27:41,320
Speaker 1: unless we have the Feds overseeing this, How do we

508
00:27:41,359 --> 00:27:43,159
Speaker 1: know what the states are going to use this money for?

509
00:27:44,880 --> 00:27:48,199
Speaker 1: And you know, not to tease too aggressively, but I

510
00:27:48,240 --> 00:27:50,159
Speaker 1: think we'll see an Act three that that was very

511
00:27:50,240 --> 00:27:51,119
Speaker 1: much a valid concern.

512
00:27:51,280 --> 00:27:55,440
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. The Feds did come after them though

513
00:27:55,600 --> 00:27:59,480
Speaker 2: they I think this was they were secretly going to

514
00:27:59,520 --> 00:28:01,239
Speaker 2: do this, and they're like, no, no, We're just going

515
00:28:01,320 --> 00:28:03,240
Speaker 2: to leave it to the states. And the tobacco companies

516
00:28:03,320 --> 00:28:05,840
Speaker 2: are like, whoa, and the Feds are like, we have

517
00:28:05,920 --> 00:28:08,320
Speaker 2: our own thing we're about to do. There was us

518
00:28:08,440 --> 00:28:13,199
Speaker 2: versus Philip Morris at all, and they saw billions and

519
00:28:13,359 --> 00:28:17,400
Speaker 2: billions of dollars in compensation for healthcare money that they

520
00:28:17,440 --> 00:28:20,359
Speaker 2: had spent out I guess basically what they had shelled

521
00:28:20,359 --> 00:28:23,880
Speaker 2: out as part of the Medicaid program. They also went

522
00:28:23,920 --> 00:28:29,480
Speaker 2: after them for RICO as racketeers and as being if

523
00:28:29,520 --> 00:28:33,080
Speaker 2: you're convicted of racketeering as an organization and you're allowed

524
00:28:33,080 --> 00:28:36,480
Speaker 2: to continue on as an organization, the Feds can basically

525
00:28:36,520 --> 00:28:39,560
Speaker 2: garnish your profits for a very long time, or they

526
00:28:39,560 --> 00:28:43,000
Speaker 2: can go back and seek previous profits, and they did.

527
00:28:43,040 --> 00:28:46,520
Speaker 2: They looked for they wanted a portion of the company's

528
00:28:46,560 --> 00:28:49,640
Speaker 2: profits from the past forty five years in this case

529
00:28:49,680 --> 00:28:53,320
Speaker 2: that was launched in nineteen ninety nine.

530
00:28:53,600 --> 00:28:57,760
Speaker 1: Yeah, and in the meantime, Phil Morris was like, hey

531
00:28:58,320 --> 00:29:02,920
Speaker 1: Phil Morris at all, thanks a lot, Like why why

532
00:29:02,960 --> 00:29:06,880
Speaker 1: has it always got to be us? They're like, you

533
00:29:06,960 --> 00:29:10,040
Speaker 1: got a great name, Phil. So the companies did not

534
00:29:10,120 --> 00:29:12,280
Speaker 1: settle this time. They're like, all right, we're getting bled

535
00:29:12,400 --> 00:29:15,040
Speaker 1: dry by the States. Now the Feds are coming after us.

536
00:29:15,040 --> 00:29:17,360
Speaker 1: So we were going to actually fight this thing, and

537
00:29:17,400 --> 00:29:20,560
Speaker 1: they lost. In two thousand and six, the District judge

538
00:29:20,560 --> 00:29:24,280
Speaker 1: for the United States a rule for the DOJ said no,

539
00:29:24,520 --> 00:29:28,479
Speaker 1: you guys are racketeers. I'm going to greatly reduce that

540
00:29:28,520 --> 00:29:32,480
Speaker 1: financial penalty down to million I'm sorry, ten billion dollars, yeah,

541
00:29:32,520 --> 00:29:35,400
Speaker 1: from the hundreds they were asking for. But you know what,

542
00:29:35,440 --> 00:29:37,880
Speaker 1: you got to admit to fraud. You have to issue

543
00:29:37,880 --> 00:29:41,360
Speaker 1: what are called corrective statements. And we got to see

544
00:29:41,400 --> 00:29:43,800
Speaker 1: all those documents because we know there are still more

545
00:29:43,840 --> 00:29:45,560
Speaker 1: documents in your coffers.

546
00:29:45,640 --> 00:29:46,120
Speaker 3: Yeah.

547
00:29:46,280 --> 00:29:49,440
Speaker 2: I think there's something like fourteen million documents that were

548
00:29:49,440 --> 00:29:51,680
Speaker 2: eventually released internal documents.

549
00:29:52,120 --> 00:29:53,239
Speaker 1: Yeah.

550
00:29:53,240 --> 00:29:56,240
Speaker 2: And then finally, remember back as part of like that

551
00:29:56,360 --> 00:29:58,880
Speaker 2: first settlement agreement.

552
00:29:58,480 --> 00:30:01,640
Speaker 3: That they tried to kick to the FED to ratify that.

553
00:30:01,800 --> 00:30:06,520
Speaker 2: Part of it was having the fdah, yeah, start regulating tobacco.

554
00:30:06,640 --> 00:30:08,040
Speaker 3: That was in nineteen ninety eight.

555
00:30:08,800 --> 00:30:11,640
Speaker 2: Yeah, in two thousand and nine, the federal government finally

556
00:30:11,640 --> 00:30:15,160
Speaker 2: got around to having the FDA regulate the tobacco industry.

557
00:30:16,360 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, let's take our second break, and we'll

558
00:30:18,680 --> 00:30:21,280
Speaker 1: come back and talk about what this all meant and

559
00:30:21,360 --> 00:30:47,200
Speaker 1: means right after this, all right, we promise talk of

560
00:30:47,240 --> 00:30:49,000
Speaker 1: what it all meant and means. And it kind of

561
00:30:49,040 --> 00:30:52,800
Speaker 1: depends on who you ask or when you ask as well,

562
00:30:53,320 --> 00:30:58,160
Speaker 1: because when it happened and Act, the Effective National Action

563
00:30:58,920 --> 00:31:03,080
Speaker 1: to Control Tobacco Group said you know what, and I

564
00:31:03,120 --> 00:31:05,600
Speaker 1: think other people too, like the American Cancer Society, the

565
00:31:05,640 --> 00:31:08,600
Speaker 1: American Psychological Association, they all got together and said, you

566
00:31:08,600 --> 00:31:11,160
Speaker 1: know what, this isn't so great, Like that McCain bill

567
00:31:11,280 --> 00:31:14,920
Speaker 1: really had teeth and that didn't pass, and we really

568
00:31:14,960 --> 00:31:17,280
Speaker 1: wanted it to. So this is sort of a win

569
00:31:17,400 --> 00:31:20,880
Speaker 1: for the cigarette companies. It had a lot of like

570
00:31:21,040 --> 00:31:24,480
Speaker 1: obvious immediate impacts. And you know, I talked about, you

571
00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:27,800
Speaker 1: know why cigarettes are so expensive, now this is partially

572
00:31:27,840 --> 00:31:30,920
Speaker 1: why because they're what's not going to happen is the

573
00:31:30,960 --> 00:31:33,280
Speaker 1: investors aren't going to lose any money, so they're going

574
00:31:33,320 --> 00:31:36,520
Speaker 1: to say, like, well, just start jacking up cigarette costs,

575
00:31:36,920 --> 00:31:39,000
Speaker 1: and a lot less people are smoking, so let's jack

576
00:31:39,040 --> 00:31:41,360
Speaker 1: them up even more because we're not going to take

577
00:31:41,360 --> 00:31:41,880
Speaker 1: a loss on this.

578
00:31:41,960 --> 00:31:43,200
Speaker 3: Yeah, what are they gonna do? Quit?

579
00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:47,640
Speaker 1: Yeah, So that started almost immediately. As far as price hiking,

580
00:31:48,800 --> 00:31:51,560
Speaker 1: like forty five to fifty cents a pack right out

581
00:31:51,600 --> 00:31:54,040
Speaker 1: of the gate was just the tip of the iceberg.

582
00:31:54,600 --> 00:31:57,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, did you say twenty dollars a pack?

583
00:31:57,600 --> 00:31:59,920
Speaker 2: I believe it, but that's still ipop.

584
00:32:00,800 --> 00:32:03,160
Speaker 1: I think a smoker told me they were like twenty

585
00:32:03,200 --> 00:32:06,480
Speaker 1: bucks in New York, but I haven't verified that.

586
00:32:07,160 --> 00:32:11,600
Speaker 2: So one of the things that really happened that people

587
00:32:11,640 --> 00:32:16,280
Speaker 2: point to the MSA as being directly responsible for is that,

588
00:32:16,400 --> 00:32:20,480
Speaker 2: like the youth smoking just dropped precipitously.

589
00:32:21,360 --> 00:32:21,640
Speaker 1: Yeah.

590
00:32:21,680 --> 00:32:25,160
Speaker 2: Once they removed the ability for tobacco companies to market

591
00:32:25,200 --> 00:32:30,120
Speaker 2: directly to kids and they simultaneously had anti smoking campaigns

592
00:32:30,160 --> 00:32:31,800
Speaker 2: targeted towards kids.

593
00:32:31,840 --> 00:32:33,160
Speaker 3: Like it really had an effect.

594
00:32:33,200 --> 00:32:36,040
Speaker 2: Like you said, went from like thirty four percent to

595
00:32:36,360 --> 00:32:38,520
Speaker 2: three point eight percent in twenty twenty one. I think

596
00:32:38,520 --> 00:32:39,520
Speaker 2: it's even lower than that.

597
00:32:39,720 --> 00:32:40,000
Speaker 3: Now.

598
00:32:40,520 --> 00:32:45,360
Speaker 2: The problem is we didn't learn anything that or we

599
00:32:45,400 --> 00:32:48,760
Speaker 2: didn't leave it open enough to apply to future kinds

600
00:32:48,800 --> 00:32:52,880
Speaker 2: of tobacco that hadn't been around. So companies like Jewel

601
00:32:52,960 --> 00:32:58,120
Speaker 2: and other e cigarette and vape companies they don't face

602
00:32:58,240 --> 00:33:01,720
Speaker 2: these same regulations and basically marketed kids. They can use

603
00:33:01,720 --> 00:33:06,440
Speaker 2: celebrity endorsers, and they do, but they still get sued

604
00:33:06,480 --> 00:33:08,760
Speaker 2: a lot. I think Jewel paid out four hundred and

605
00:33:08,840 --> 00:33:12,880
Speaker 2: sixty two million to six different states in twenty twenty three,

606
00:33:13,480 --> 00:33:17,360
Speaker 2: So it's still going on. But that's been a huge

607
00:33:17,440 --> 00:33:23,320
Speaker 2: dent in the incredible success of the curbing teen smoking.

608
00:33:24,400 --> 00:33:27,120
Speaker 2: It's gone back up if you include vaping and hookahs

609
00:33:27,160 --> 00:33:29,920
Speaker 2: and stuff like that. But I have also the impression

610
00:33:30,000 --> 00:33:34,160
Speaker 2: that kids are a little smarter than we were at

611
00:33:34,160 --> 00:33:37,320
Speaker 2: that age. Yeah, and they are seeing through a lot

612
00:33:37,320 --> 00:33:39,880
Speaker 2: of this and it's not working quite as well as

613
00:33:39,920 --> 00:33:41,800
Speaker 2: it did on us in the nineties.

614
00:33:42,600 --> 00:33:45,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know, more parental oversight and just there's

615
00:33:45,840 --> 00:33:49,120
Speaker 1: a lot of factors for sure. On the egs. I

616
00:33:49,160 --> 00:33:51,280
Speaker 1: think their day has come a little bit, but I

617
00:33:51,320 --> 00:33:55,040
Speaker 1: think that it's really there and for some bad stuff

618
00:33:55,080 --> 00:33:59,760
Speaker 1: moving forward because of just all the all the stuff

619
00:33:59,760 --> 00:34:01,360
Speaker 1: that goes into that juice you know.

620
00:34:01,560 --> 00:34:06,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, we took a pretty solid stand or position

621
00:34:06,160 --> 00:34:08,880
Speaker 2: on vaping. I think we were if I remember correctly,

622
00:34:08,920 --> 00:34:12,080
Speaker 2: we were opposed to it in our episode on vaping.

623
00:34:13,800 --> 00:34:16,239
Speaker 1: That's right. The other thing that the settlements led to

624
00:34:16,480 --> 00:34:19,320
Speaker 1: was just a turning of the tide, not just with

625
00:34:19,400 --> 00:34:21,640
Speaker 1: kids smoking, but smoking in general, which was what they

626
00:34:21,640 --> 00:34:24,760
Speaker 1: were after, was like, let's just try and get smoking

627
00:34:24,880 --> 00:34:29,600
Speaker 1: way down overall, and individual states started enacting bands. I

628
00:34:29,640 --> 00:34:32,440
Speaker 1: think in ninety eight, Utah and California were the first

629
00:34:32,480 --> 00:34:35,000
Speaker 1: and only ones to say, like, hey, you can't smoke

630
00:34:35,040 --> 00:34:38,120
Speaker 1: in restaurants anymore, you can't smoke in public places. Second

631
00:34:38,120 --> 00:34:41,359
Speaker 1: hand smoke is a real thing, and most states had

632
00:34:41,360 --> 00:34:46,279
Speaker 1: these bands in place now and people just generally look

633
00:34:46,320 --> 00:34:48,960
Speaker 1: at smoking differently, like, you know, when someone lights up

634
00:34:49,000 --> 00:34:52,080
Speaker 1: in public, I guess unless you're in Philadelphia, there are

635
00:34:52,239 --> 00:34:54,839
Speaker 1: a lot of people now that will look sort of like,

636
00:34:55,000 --> 00:34:56,319
Speaker 1: what are you doing dude?

637
00:34:56,400 --> 00:34:56,640
Speaker 3: Yeah?

638
00:34:56,680 --> 00:35:00,239
Speaker 2: Like who still does that exactly? Or when you a

639
00:35:00,320 --> 00:35:02,600
Speaker 2: cigarette filter out the window when you're done with it.

640
00:35:03,719 --> 00:35:08,000
Speaker 1: JESU, so sorry, I just went to a dark place.

641
00:35:08,080 --> 00:35:09,320
Speaker 3: Now, I'm with you, I understand.

642
00:35:09,480 --> 00:35:12,320
Speaker 1: So upsetting, Yeah, especially when one flicks off your windshield

643
00:35:12,400 --> 00:35:13,560
Speaker 1: and you see a spark bounce.

644
00:35:13,840 --> 00:35:14,560
Speaker 3: Well that's kind of.

645
00:35:16,280 --> 00:35:17,719
Speaker 1: Well, just briefly, Yes.

646
00:35:18,400 --> 00:35:21,960
Speaker 2: So there was a lot of a lot of success

647
00:35:22,000 --> 00:35:25,960
Speaker 2: directly from the Master Settlement Agreement. Let's talk about the

648
00:35:26,000 --> 00:35:28,319
Speaker 2: problems with the Master Settlement Agreement, because a lot of

649
00:35:28,320 --> 00:35:30,120
Speaker 2: people are like, this could have been done better, we

650
00:35:30,120 --> 00:35:35,000
Speaker 2: should have done the McCain bill right. And then really importantly,

651
00:35:35,239 --> 00:35:37,600
Speaker 2: there were only a couple of states that had the

652
00:35:37,640 --> 00:35:44,520
Speaker 2: foresight to designate the payments from the Master Settlement Agreement

653
00:35:44,600 --> 00:35:48,000
Speaker 2: from the tobacco companies that are made annually in perpetuity.

654
00:35:48,120 --> 00:35:51,120
Speaker 2: I hadn't realized this. There's no end date to these

655
00:35:51,120 --> 00:35:56,040
Speaker 2: payments as far as I know, which I don't fully

656
00:35:56,120 --> 00:35:59,719
Speaker 2: understand because I think they settled on like an actual number, right,

657
00:36:00,120 --> 00:36:02,000
Speaker 2: So that doesn't quite make sense to me. But I've

658
00:36:02,000 --> 00:36:05,200
Speaker 2: seen in multiple places that these are imperpetuity payments.

659
00:36:06,200 --> 00:36:08,319
Speaker 1: Yeah. The only thing I can figure out there is

660
00:36:08,360 --> 00:36:10,960
Speaker 1: they're like, hey, you're still selling cigarettes and this is

661
00:36:11,000 --> 00:36:14,000
Speaker 1: still a problem for medicaid. So it's not like that's

662
00:36:14,040 --> 00:36:15,480
Speaker 1: ever going to stop. That's the only thing I can

663
00:36:15,520 --> 00:36:15,960
Speaker 1: figure out.

664
00:36:16,000 --> 00:36:17,600
Speaker 3: Yeah, I've got that. I get that too.

665
00:36:17,719 --> 00:36:20,440
Speaker 2: I think that that's probably it that's the best argument

666
00:36:20,520 --> 00:36:22,760
Speaker 2: for it. But then does that mean that their ultimate

667
00:36:22,800 --> 00:36:27,080
Speaker 2: payouts are going to exceed that the hundreds of billions

668
00:36:27,120 --> 00:36:29,239
Speaker 2: of dollars that they agreed to pay out to the

669
00:36:29,239 --> 00:36:32,319
Speaker 2: states over twenty five years. Like, that's the part I

670
00:36:32,320 --> 00:36:36,000
Speaker 2: don't get. But the problem is that the states, very

671
00:36:36,000 --> 00:36:39,680
Speaker 2: few states actually said this money is designated for anti

672
00:36:39,680 --> 00:36:43,880
Speaker 2: smoking programs, to pay for health care for smokers, or

673
00:36:44,200 --> 00:36:49,280
Speaker 2: to repay public costs for healthcare that we spend on smokers.

674
00:36:50,200 --> 00:36:52,640
Speaker 2: A lot of states don't do that, and in fact,

675
00:36:53,360 --> 00:36:56,480
Speaker 2: most of the states use it to like fill budget

676
00:36:56,520 --> 00:37:00,880
Speaker 2: gaps to build new roads. If there's rap, they do

677
00:37:00,920 --> 00:37:04,800
Speaker 2: something called securitization, where they sell bonds against their future

678
00:37:04,920 --> 00:37:07,160
Speaker 2: annual payment from the tobacco companies.

679
00:37:07,200 --> 00:37:07,799
Speaker 3: Did you see that?

680
00:37:08,040 --> 00:37:12,799
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's kind of you know, it's a shell

681
00:37:12,840 --> 00:37:14,440
Speaker 1: game with the government in a way, In a lot

682
00:37:14,440 --> 00:37:15,200
Speaker 1: of ways, I think.

683
00:37:15,120 --> 00:37:17,759
Speaker 2: Yeah, because not only are they I mean, it's just

684
00:37:17,920 --> 00:37:20,960
Speaker 2: unseemly in the first place, but secondly, when those bonds

685
00:37:21,000 --> 00:37:24,000
Speaker 2: come due, when they get that Master Settlement Agreement annual

686
00:37:24,080 --> 00:37:27,040
Speaker 2: payment to the state, they have to pay out not

687
00:37:27,160 --> 00:37:29,680
Speaker 2: just the face value of the bonds that they sold,

688
00:37:30,040 --> 00:37:31,960
Speaker 2: they have to use some of that money to pay

689
00:37:32,000 --> 00:37:35,600
Speaker 2: the interest too, So the state's getting less than it

690
00:37:35,640 --> 00:37:38,839
Speaker 2: would have if it didn't sell those bonds ahead of time. Right,

691
00:37:39,280 --> 00:37:42,279
Speaker 2: So I think that's a sign of poor management of

692
00:37:42,320 --> 00:37:43,520
Speaker 2: a state typically if you.

693
00:37:43,480 --> 00:37:46,880
Speaker 1: Ask me, Yeah, for sure. I think in the end,

694
00:37:46,960 --> 00:37:50,920
Speaker 1: less than three percent of these funds have gone to

695
00:37:50,960 --> 00:37:55,239
Speaker 1: smoking prevention and cessation programs, which was a lot of

696
00:37:55,280 --> 00:37:57,960
Speaker 1: the reason they initially said they were going to do this.

697
00:37:59,360 --> 00:38:04,080
Speaker 1: And I think no state has funded anti tobacco programs

698
00:38:04,719 --> 00:38:07,960
Speaker 1: at CDC recommended levels at all.

699
00:38:07,719 --> 00:38:10,640
Speaker 2: Right, and some states even used them to help the

700
00:38:10,680 --> 00:38:14,800
Speaker 2: tobacco industry. I know North Carolina, Oh man, they spent

701
00:38:15,320 --> 00:38:22,400
Speaker 2: forty five billion dollars, I think on modernizing tobacco farms,

702
00:38:22,480 --> 00:38:24,879
Speaker 2: not hey, here's money for your losses. And I think

703
00:38:24,880 --> 00:38:29,880
Speaker 2: I said, forty forty two million, not like, here's some

704
00:38:29,920 --> 00:38:32,520
Speaker 2: money to compensate you for your losses. Here's some money

705
00:38:32,560 --> 00:38:35,399
Speaker 2: to get better at tobacco farming for the future. That's

706
00:38:35,440 --> 00:38:38,480
Speaker 2: what That's what North Carolina spent some of its money on.

707
00:38:39,440 --> 00:38:43,400
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think North Carolina big tobacco state. Obviously, they

708
00:38:43,480 --> 00:38:47,080
Speaker 1: use seventy five percent of their settlement funds for tobacco production.

709
00:38:47,600 --> 00:38:51,319
Speaker 1: It's crazy some of that to private tobacco producers like

710
00:38:51,360 --> 00:38:54,520
Speaker 1: you talked about that had taken a hit. But also yeah,

711
00:38:54,560 --> 00:38:59,360
Speaker 1: like you said, like, hey, you want a tobacco museum,

712
00:39:00,080 --> 00:39:01,680
Speaker 1: will build it with that money.

713
00:39:01,520 --> 00:39:04,200
Speaker 2: Right, And if we build it, they will come to

714
00:39:04,239 --> 00:39:05,200
Speaker 2: the tobacco company.

715
00:39:05,239 --> 00:39:06,960
Speaker 1: Oh man, that's hard to believe on that one.

716
00:39:07,000 --> 00:39:10,799
Speaker 2: There's another thing too, The tobacco companies haven't exactly paid

717
00:39:10,800 --> 00:39:12,719
Speaker 2: out all this money. They were supposed to pay out

718
00:39:12,760 --> 00:39:15,240
Speaker 2: the couple hundred I think what it was, three hundred

719
00:39:15,320 --> 00:39:17,880
Speaker 2: something billion dollars over twenty five years as part of

720
00:39:17,920 --> 00:39:21,040
Speaker 2: the settlement in nineteen ninety eight. They have paid out,

721
00:39:21,080 --> 00:39:25,920
Speaker 2: according to a press release from Vermont's Attorney General office,

722
00:39:26,760 --> 00:39:29,920
Speaker 2: one hundred and seventy five billion, So I think less

723
00:39:29,960 --> 00:39:32,040
Speaker 2: than half of what they said. And it's been a

724
00:39:32,080 --> 00:39:35,040
Speaker 2: lot longer than twenty five years now, right. And one

725
00:39:35,080 --> 00:39:37,960
Speaker 2: of the reasons why is because as part of the

726
00:39:38,000 --> 00:39:43,640
Speaker 2: agreement the tobacco companies, there are two calculations that have

727
00:39:43,680 --> 00:39:46,279
Speaker 2: to be taken into account. There has to be an

728
00:39:46,400 --> 00:39:50,200
Speaker 2: inflation calculation that it's just for inflation, so that the

729
00:39:50,239 --> 00:39:53,000
Speaker 2: states are getting their actual value of the dollars that

730
00:39:53,040 --> 00:39:57,080
Speaker 2: the tobacco companies agreed to. That makes sense. There's also

731
00:39:57,280 --> 00:40:01,359
Speaker 2: a sales formula that they have to calculate every year

732
00:40:02,560 --> 00:40:06,720
Speaker 2: to take into account the amount of profits that they're

733
00:40:06,800 --> 00:40:10,640
Speaker 2: losing to companies that aren't part of the Master Settlement

734
00:40:10,680 --> 00:40:15,440
Speaker 2: Agreement and therefore aren't hamstrung by those payments, which means

735
00:40:15,480 --> 00:40:20,759
Speaker 2: that in some cases, some years there have been the

736
00:40:20,840 --> 00:40:26,160
Speaker 2: sales calculation has been larger than the inflation calculation. Right,

737
00:40:26,520 --> 00:40:30,920
Speaker 2: So the states have shouldered the burden of competition for

738
00:40:31,000 --> 00:40:34,680
Speaker 2: these tobacco companies, Like the States took on that loss

739
00:40:34,680 --> 00:40:37,560
Speaker 2: for the tobacco companies, which is just disgusting to me.

740
00:40:38,640 --> 00:40:40,919
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know, when you just think about what's

741
00:40:40,960 --> 00:40:43,960
Speaker 1: happened with the raising the cost of cigarettes, there's a

742
00:40:43,960 --> 00:40:46,640
Speaker 1: lot of people that look at the settlement of like, well,

743
00:40:46,640 --> 00:40:49,760
Speaker 1: now you're just getting like the tobacco companies aren't paying states,

744
00:40:49,880 --> 00:40:53,720
Speaker 1: Like people who still smoke cigarettes are just funneling money

745
00:40:53,760 --> 00:40:55,640
Speaker 1: through the tobacco companies to the states.

746
00:40:56,239 --> 00:41:01,359
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a great way to put it, okay, Chuck.

747
00:41:01,440 --> 00:41:03,480
Speaker 2: So one of the other things the legacies of the

748
00:41:03,520 --> 00:41:06,359
Speaker 2: Master Settlement Agreement is it created a blueprint. I think

749
00:41:06,400 --> 00:41:10,560
Speaker 2: you said this kind of early on for other ways

750
00:41:10,600 --> 00:41:14,560
Speaker 2: that states could get together and create real change against

751
00:41:14,640 --> 00:41:20,280
Speaker 2: corporate malfeasance, specifically, again in cases where there is harm

752
00:41:20,520 --> 00:41:25,160
Speaker 2: that comes directly from using a product as directed or

753
00:41:25,160 --> 00:41:28,279
Speaker 2: intended right, not abusing it or something you're just using

754
00:41:28,280 --> 00:41:30,520
Speaker 2: it like it's supposed to be used and you're being harmed.

755
00:41:30,800 --> 00:41:34,960
Speaker 2: So you have things like social media, opioids, climate change

756
00:41:34,960 --> 00:41:38,560
Speaker 2: is a trickier one, but fast food and the reason

757
00:41:38,600 --> 00:41:42,640
Speaker 2: why also they fit this Master Settlement Agreement framework is

758
00:41:42,680 --> 00:41:46,160
Speaker 2: these companies are following like a lot of the same

759
00:41:46,520 --> 00:41:50,040
Speaker 2: techniques that the tobacco industry laid down by starting back

760
00:41:50,080 --> 00:41:50,800
Speaker 2: in the fifties.

761
00:41:51,960 --> 00:41:56,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's interesting because there's there are two playbooks. On

762
00:41:56,120 --> 00:41:58,040
Speaker 1: the one side, you have the government. Now that's like

763
00:41:58,080 --> 00:42:00,799
Speaker 1: all right, now, we got a playbook moving forward, so

764
00:42:00,840 --> 00:42:05,640
Speaker 1: we can sue Meta about social media and the harms

765
00:42:05,680 --> 00:42:08,520
Speaker 1: to children and the fact that they know they're targeting

766
00:42:08,600 --> 00:42:12,719
Speaker 1: children and harming children, or opioids of course with the

767
00:42:12,760 --> 00:42:15,480
Speaker 1: pharmaceutical companies. But then there's that other playbook like you

768
00:42:15,520 --> 00:42:19,200
Speaker 1: were talking about, where they end up getting sued. But

769
00:42:19,840 --> 00:42:23,040
Speaker 1: Meta and the pharmaceutical companies were like, hey, you know

770
00:42:23,080 --> 00:42:25,520
Speaker 1: what if we can get kids hooked on this stuff

771
00:42:25,520 --> 00:42:28,680
Speaker 1: and market to children, then we can make a lot

772
00:42:28,680 --> 00:42:29,800
Speaker 1: more money for investors.

773
00:42:29,880 --> 00:42:33,200
Speaker 2: Yeah, a good example of that, not necessarily targeting children,

774
00:42:33,239 --> 00:42:36,520
Speaker 2: but of just this completely screwing up the narrative for

775
00:42:36,560 --> 00:42:39,400
Speaker 2: their own gain at the expense.

776
00:42:39,000 --> 00:42:39,840
Speaker 3: Of people's lives.

777
00:42:40,239 --> 00:42:47,160
Speaker 2: The opioid pharmaceutical industry with opioids basically floated this idea

778
00:42:47,280 --> 00:42:51,279
Speaker 2: called pseudo addiction to where the people who were supposedly

779
00:42:51,280 --> 00:42:55,680
Speaker 2: addicted to opioids weren't actually addicted. What was happening is

780
00:42:55,680 --> 00:42:58,839
Speaker 2: that their pain wasn't being managed adequately. That's why they

781
00:42:58,880 --> 00:43:01,760
Speaker 2: needed to take more. We're going around from doctor to doctor,

782
00:43:02,080 --> 00:43:04,680
Speaker 2: and the answer the solution was to up their dose,

783
00:43:05,120 --> 00:43:06,800
Speaker 2: don't cut them off, don't put them in treatment.

784
00:43:06,920 --> 00:43:07,640
Speaker 3: Up their dose.

785
00:43:07,719 --> 00:43:10,000
Speaker 2: That's what they really need, because it's not real addiction

786
00:43:10,040 --> 00:43:10,840
Speaker 2: because you can't.

787
00:43:10,680 --> 00:43:12,080
Speaker 3: Get addicted to opioids.

788
00:43:12,280 --> 00:43:16,080
Speaker 2: They actually publicly said stuff like that, and I mean

789
00:43:16,200 --> 00:43:18,600
Speaker 2: that's cause to go after them alone, you.

790
00:43:18,560 --> 00:43:24,000
Speaker 1: Know, yeah, I mean, yeah, just as despicable as any

791
00:43:24,040 --> 00:43:28,680
Speaker 1: of these huge corporations sort of issuing these really flimsy

792
00:43:28,719 --> 00:43:32,239
Speaker 1: denials that the public just it just makes them look worse.

793
00:43:32,280 --> 00:43:33,880
Speaker 1: You know, the public doesn't buy this stuff.

794
00:43:34,920 --> 00:43:37,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's true now I think we did before.

795
00:43:37,960 --> 00:43:39,640
Speaker 1: Yeah you know, yeah, you're probably right.

796
00:43:40,800 --> 00:43:41,560
Speaker 3: You got anything else?

797
00:43:42,760 --> 00:43:46,040
Speaker 1: I got nothing else. That's uh, this is we gotta Yeah.

798
00:43:46,160 --> 00:43:48,120
Speaker 1: I feel like this is in a suite of episodes

799
00:43:48,120 --> 00:43:50,959
Speaker 1: we've done over the years. Josh and Chuck take on the.

800
00:43:50,880 --> 00:43:56,600
Speaker 2: World, big Industry. Well, Chuck doesn't have anything else. Chuck

801
00:43:56,600 --> 00:43:58,560
Speaker 2: said the world, and I said big industry, So that

802
00:43:58,640 --> 00:44:01,399
Speaker 2: combination obviously unlocked listener mail.

803
00:44:04,719 --> 00:44:08,480
Speaker 1: Hey, guys, amongst my favorite things, and that's favorite with

804
00:44:08,520 --> 00:44:11,960
Speaker 1: an ou So I think I know where Rebecca's from,

805
00:44:12,160 --> 00:44:14,240
Speaker 1: or at least you know one of a few places

806
00:44:14,719 --> 00:44:17,080
Speaker 1: she could be from. One of my favorite things about

807
00:44:17,120 --> 00:44:21,439
Speaker 1: stuff you should know is Josh's jokes that don't land. Wow,

808
00:44:21,560 --> 00:44:25,440
Speaker 1: all right, absolutely hates my jokes that don't land, by

809
00:44:25,440 --> 00:44:28,520
Speaker 1: the way, so you should feel good and counting how

810
00:44:28,520 --> 00:44:32,320
Speaker 1: many no, no, no, okay, and counting how many times

811
00:44:32,400 --> 00:44:35,080
Speaker 1: Chuck says that's right in an episode, I guess i'd

812
00:44:35,120 --> 00:44:36,280
Speaker 1: feel like I say sure more.

813
00:44:36,160 --> 00:44:38,120
Speaker 2: Than more than that's right, but you say for sure

814
00:44:38,200 --> 00:44:41,080
Speaker 2: for sure, yeah for sure, But just one time I

815
00:44:41,239 --> 00:44:43,279
Speaker 2: was adding a for sure to the first for sure

816
00:44:44,360 --> 00:44:44,840
Speaker 2: for sure.

817
00:44:45,680 --> 00:44:48,040
Speaker 1: My absolute favorite thing, though, guys has to be the

818
00:44:48,040 --> 00:44:49,479
Speaker 1: interlude jingles before and after.

819
00:44:49,560 --> 00:44:50,000
Speaker 3: Yeah.

820
00:44:50,080 --> 00:44:51,960
Speaker 1: I love how the jingle always matches the theme of

821
00:44:51,960 --> 00:44:54,400
Speaker 1: the show. For example, the short stuff on the Benefits

822
00:44:54,400 --> 00:44:57,520
Speaker 1: of Singing in a group had the barbershop Quartet episode

823
00:44:57,520 --> 00:44:59,960
Speaker 1: about Shakespeare had the green sleeve style jingle. In Schoolhouse

824
00:45:00,160 --> 00:45:03,799
Speaker 1: Rock had the queen style jingle. My favorite one might

825
00:45:03,840 --> 00:45:06,920
Speaker 1: have been the techno punk jingles on the Cyberpunk episode,

826
00:45:07,120 --> 00:45:09,560
Speaker 1: which was fantastic. All that to say, shout out to

827
00:45:09,600 --> 00:45:12,600
Speaker 1: Jerry and the folks who produce these. They are appreciated,

828
00:45:13,200 --> 00:45:15,680
Speaker 1: and Rebecca, I'm glad you brought this up. We said

829
00:45:15,680 --> 00:45:18,120
Speaker 1: it a lot over the years, but it always bears

830
00:45:18,120 --> 00:45:19,800
Speaker 1: repeating that, you know, these are written by Stuff you

831
00:45:19,800 --> 00:45:22,920
Speaker 1: should Know listers and produced and performed and we just

832
00:45:23,000 --> 00:45:25,120
Speaker 1: get these and people are like, hey, use this thing.

833
00:45:25,800 --> 00:45:27,640
Speaker 1: I made it as a love letter to the show.

834
00:45:28,040 --> 00:45:30,400
Speaker 1: And then Jerry does a great job of selecting the

835
00:45:30,440 --> 00:45:33,880
Speaker 1: episodes where it has a nice bit, so we always

836
00:45:33,960 --> 00:45:38,279
Speaker 1: like reiterating this is how it works, and Rebecca since

837
00:45:38,400 --> 00:45:41,600
Speaker 1: kindess regards in a PS. Shout out to Rebecca's twin

838
00:45:41,640 --> 00:45:44,640
Speaker 1: sister Lauren, who introduced Rebecca to Stuff you Should Know

839
00:45:44,680 --> 00:45:48,360
Speaker 1: many years ago and they have been regularly discussing episodes

840
00:45:48,400 --> 00:45:49,720
Speaker 1: weekly since that's awesome.

841
00:45:51,120 --> 00:45:53,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you. We love it when a family member

842
00:45:53,880 --> 00:45:56,600
Speaker 2: or friend turns somebody onto Stuff you Should Know and

843
00:45:56,640 --> 00:45:59,080
Speaker 2: then they end up talking about or listening together.

844
00:45:59,160 --> 00:46:00,000
Speaker 3: That's kind of the point.

845
00:46:01,000 --> 00:46:02,840
Speaker 1: That's how a community has formed. Everybody.

846
00:46:02,960 --> 00:46:05,280
Speaker 2: Also shout out to Dave and Ben too, who also

847
00:46:05,320 --> 00:46:09,000
Speaker 2: do a pretty boss job of selecting jingles, but I.

848
00:46:08,520 --> 00:46:10,000
Speaker 3: Think Jerry's probably the goat.

849
00:46:11,520 --> 00:46:11,880
Speaker 1: Agreed.

850
00:46:12,760 --> 00:46:15,120
Speaker 2: If you want to be like Rebecca and by proxy

851
00:46:15,239 --> 00:46:18,040
Speaker 2: Lauren and get in touch with this via email, all

852
00:46:18,040 --> 00:46:20,080
Speaker 2: you have to do is send it off to Stuff

853
00:46:20,160 --> 00:46:26,719
Speaker 2: Podcasts at iHeartRadio dot com.

854
00:46:26,880 --> 00:46:29,759
Speaker 3: Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For

855
00:46:29,840 --> 00:46:34,040
Speaker 3: more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

856
00:46:34,120 --> 00:46:35,960
Speaker 3: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.