Florida/Georgia Personal Injury & Workers Compensation

...entirety, inclusive of the federal excise tax reimbursements, shipping costs, and other various charges. ANALYSIS Florida’s OTP statute imposes both a surcharge and a tax upon the wholesale sales price of tobacco that is regulated by the statute. § 210.276(1) (“A surcharge is levied upon all tobacco products in this state and upon any person engaged in business as a distributor of tobacco products at the rate of 60 percent of the wholesale sales price.”); § 210.30(1) (“A tax is hereby...

...The Florida Legislature imposes excise taxes and surcharges on defined tobacco products other than cigarettes (commonly referred to as “Other Tobacco Products,” or “OTP”)—taxes and surcharges paid by the distributors of those products. See §§ 210.276, 210.30, Fla....

...e for smoking,” rendering section 210.25(12), Florida Statutes, inapplicable to its product and entitling it to a refund of the OTP taxes and surcharges paid. II A Sections 210.276 and 210.30, Florida Statutes, set forth the OTP tax and surcharge at issue here. One imposes “[a] surcharge . . . levied upon all tobacco products in this state and upon any person engaged in business as a distributor of tobacco products.” § 210.276(1), Fla....

...Going with this more specific meaning focuses on doing something to the tobacco rather than on why it is being used in this way, thereby ignoring a purpose of tobacco taxation, abundantly clear from its text—regulation of the addictive behavior relating to nicotine. Cf. § 210.276(1), Fla....

...4 4 We do not address whether use of an electric or electronic heating element would produce a different outcome. But we suggest that how the loose tobacco actually is used in individual 13  This more general meaning better comports with what sections 210.276 and 210.30 do—subject loose tobacco to heavy charges and taxation (other than that type of tobacco already rolled into cigarettes and cigars) if it is prepared and sold for use as a nicotine delivery vehicle....