Poll: Calif. voters back $2-a-pack tax
By Tracy Seipel and Jessica Calefati, San Jose Mercury News
SACRAMENTO — A day after a state senator revived a bill to hike the state’s cigarette tax by $2 a pack, a new Field Poll unveiled Thursday found that two-thirds of California voters back such a tax increase.
That’s one of the key findings in the second part of the polling firm’s ninth annual health policy survey, funded by the California Wellness Foundation.
The poll also found that voter satisfaction with the state’s health care system overall has steadily grown from 50 percent in 2008, to 52 percent in 2012, to 58 percent today — nearly two years after most of the provisions of the Affordable Care Act went into effect.