Singapore heaps on the taxes for alcohol and cigarettes, so that a liter of beer in a bar costs $16 SGD ($10 USD) and cigarettes cost $9 SGD ($6 USD). Everyone seems to complain about it, but they still consume them anyway. Hilarious to me, not so hilarious to them.

Econ says that people will probably reduce consumption and/or find substitutes. I'm happy with drinking high-caffeine coffee, although I bet people have other substitutes readily available, so I'll try to figure out what they use. Most likely not narcotics, as you get the death penalty for trafficking in drugs here. Time to ask a lot more questions....

Interesting side note, the cheep cigarettes here are "LD Cigarettes", which have close-up pictures of massive tumors on people's necks. When I saw that, I asked to see the box, and then asked if I could write on it with my Sharpie. When I handed the box back, it said "LD 50 Cigarettes", the med student from Holland starts laughing and everyone else is like WTF?