
For every pack of cigarettes smoked the country reaps net savings of $.32 (2009) - hirundo
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2009-04-smokers-society-money.html
======
lev99
According to their statistics smoking a pack a day from age 18-65 would save
the country $5489.

I disagree that we should only be looking at medical costs when considering
the total cost of smoking vs non-smoking. About $5500 per lifetime, is so
small that unaccounted for costs could easily tip the scale either way. What
effect does nicotine have on job performance. What are the costs spent in
creating smoking sections in public places like airports. Do smokers have
higher patents per person because of mingling near the ashtray, or do they
have lower patents per person because they leave the room to go on smoke
breaks? More data is needed, their conclusion is not conclusive.

~~~
mistermann
> More data is needed, their conclusion is not conclusive.

Do you demand the same evidence from anti-smoking advocates, who focus mainly
on the costs, plus a little fear inducing imagined health risks of second hand
smoke?

~~~
lev99
Why are you making this about me? I'd be more then happy to talk numbers but
unwilling to talk about myself.

~~~
mistermann
I think it may have been you that made it about you: "I disagree..."

Regardless, they are advocating for policy on half the numbers and someone is
protesting that, you seem to be opposed to the protest due to their numbers
being inconclusive or incomplete, which is a related but different argument.
Or am I mistaken?

~~~
lev99
Start with whatever answer you like, and then ask the right questions to get
the right answers, and you can make a spreadsheet that backs up your initial
position. All arguments inspire nihilism when deconstructed.

Descartes started an argument with one axiom, "I think therefrom I am" and
logiced his way back to his initial worldview.

I kind of wanted to get into an argument about numbers, not an argument about
what makes a valid argument. Because there are no valid arguments.

Back to smoking. One of the more honest cost analysis of smoking is the
chapter Estimating the Costs of Tobacco Use in "Tobacco Control in Developing
Countries"(2000). The entire paper is riddled with admissions that they are
using uncertain data, they are omitting missing data, and that even if the
data was perfect the statistics relay on assumptions. They also don't
calculate the benefit of early death and reach a price fairly close to
neutral(1.1%-.1% of gdp). So yeah, personally I don't trust their numbers
either. Thanks for asking.

~~~
mistermann
> I kind of wanted to get into an argument about numbers, not an argument
> about what makes a valid argument

Then don't complain about people "making it about you".

> Because there are no valid arguments.

Well then, looks like we're all done here.

> They also don't calculate the benefit of early death and reach a price
> fairly close to neutral(1.1%-.1% of gdp).

If you leave out certain costs, you can indeed reach whatever conclusion you'd
like.

> Thanks for asking.

Thanks for reminding me I have to check my reddit inbox.

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tinus_hn
This line of reasoning suggests that euthanizing the elderly is a net saving,
which is quite a dangerous direction.

~~~
ben_w
Only when “saving money” is the entirety of your decision-making does that
become dangerous.

Ultimately, money is only useful when spent — and despite intergenerational
cultural difference, I think quite a lot of younger people like myself still
want to be in a society that spends some of its wealth looking after the
elderly.

------
zaroth
"It looks unpleasant or ghoulish to look at the cost savings as well as the
cost increases and it's not a good thing that smoking kills people," Viscusi
said in an interview. "But if you're going to follow this health-cost train
all the way, you have to take into account all the effects, not just the ones
you like in terms of getting your bill passed."

I can't see anything _ghoulish_ about it at all. Seems to me if you only count
the direct negative costs (treating the lung cancers, lost productivity) and
ignore any of the cost savings (no long term end-of-life care because you died
from the lung cancer) that's just a failure of actuarial science and lack of a
proper systematic analysis of the costs and benefits.

What makes accounting for the cost of treating a certain number of additional
lung cancer cases any less "ghoulish" than accounting for the savings of not
treating a certain number of alzheimers cases?

No one is saying the singular goal is to reduce cost, reductio ad absurdum,
but if you're claiming smokers are a burden to society because you did the
math wrong and it fits your world belief and sense of moral justice, that's no
longer science, it's politics. We can do both well, but shouldn't pretend one
thing is the other.

~~~
jbob2000
It is ghoulish. It stupid obvious that _people dying saves the healthcare
industry money_ , but it's not a thought you should entertain because it
offers no solutions. It's ghoulish because it promotes the idea that letting
people die is "better" than trying to save them. "Here Steve, smoke another
pack so you can go quickly instead of slowly".

Why have a healthcare industry at all? It would cost us nothing at all to let
people just die instead of trying to save them. Diabetes costs hundreds of
thousands of dollars to treat over a lifetime, why not save the cost and just
let diabetics OD on sugar?

~~~
mistermann
> Why have a healthcare industry at all?

To stop people from dying. I think the point of the article is that the
economic factors given in anti-smoking propaganda are false.

~~~
dragonwriter
> To stop people from dying.

To improve people's quality × duration of life is probably more accurate;
stopping people from dying (if you maintain positive quality of life, which is
a big if) is the limit case of that, but not really the _purpose_ of
healthcare; real healthcare systems may delay death but don't stop it and
remain valuable.

------
zappo2938
Still far, far cheaper than the hidden cost of alcohol. [0]

[0][https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/10/16/the-h...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/10/16/the-
hidden-cost-of-your-drinking-habit/?utm_term=.d3f030d16e62)

~~~
JadeNB
> Still far, far cheaper than the hidden cost of alcohol.

The essay is not about the hidden _cost_ of smoking, as you might expect, but
on the hidden _profit_ of smoking. (Spoiler: You have to be careful to define
profit very narrowly.)

------
blang
Planet money did an excellent podcast that touches on this subject.

[https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2010/07/16/128569258/the-...](https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2010/07/16/128569258/the-
friday-podcast-death-saves-you-money)

