Your money up in smoke

Incentive to kick the habit could be in your wallet

Author: JESSE HELLING, Messenger staff writer

Posted By: Cigs By Mail .com

Intro:
A pack of Marlboro cigarettes sells for $5.09, plus tax, at a local convenience store. That means that someone who swings by on their way to work each morning is shelling out more than $25.45 per week. Add in the weekends and the price goes up to $35.63.

At this price, a pack-a-day smoker would spend more than $1,857.85 over the course of a year, enough for round-trip airfare for two to see Marlboros being made in Richmond, Va.

If they start at the legal age of 18, by the time they hit 30, they've spent more than $22,294.20 - plenty to buy nine 50-inch plasma screen televisions.
By age 65, one pack of cigarettes a day adds up to $87,300.15, meaning a smoker would have spent enough to send their grandchild to college. . . .
Economic impact, as well as raising awareness of health issues, are two means by which the American Cancer Society hopes to convince people to quit smoking.

A recent $1-per-pack tax increase on cigarettes has been cited by legislators as a means to diminish smoking in Iowa. Smoking rates among Iowa adults dropped from 21.4 percent in 2006 to 19.4 percent in 2007, according to the Iowa Department of Public Health.

Today is the 33rd Great American Smoke-Out, an event organized by the American Cancer Society.
Jump to full article