Re this thread "I’d Murder For A Bloody Fag I’m curious just how much smoking costs. I don’t smoke, and when I look at the “carton” prices advertised by various convenience store window posters I’m stunned by how expensive they seem.
How much does it cost a person to smoke? Are the generic brands a lot less expensive? Is there a significant difference in taste quality between cheaper and premium brands?
Depends on where one lives but here in Ohio, I was paying between $4.35 & $4.65 per pack for Parliaments so averaging that out to $4.50/pack, at one pack a day on weekdays and two on weekends, I was paying about $2100 per year.
It was ridiculous. I quit 4 months ago, by the way, and have saved $442.00 so far.
After watching my parents for the last 20 odd years, expense hinges on <cue Captian Obvious> what you smoke and how often. Dad recently quit smoking, but now goes through 2 packs of cigrarellos a day. I think they’re about $6 a pack.
Smokers seem to be really loyal to the brand they pick. Mom would occasionally do generics, but only when pressed by extreme despiration.
You’d think that and giving me chronic bronchitis as a kid would convince them. Sigh.
My brand is currently about $6/pack, and I smoke about a pack a week. So… a little more than $300/year. I have few other vices; I spend almost nothing on alcohol, for example.
I can tell you exactly (because this is a budgeted item for me):
$778.08
One carton of Malboro Lights 24 times a year.
I roll my own cigs, and go through about a can of tobacco a week at $13 a can.
(premium stuff, I refuse to kill myself with anything but the best.) With taxes, lighters, and all it’s probably close to $750 a year. I’ve never ran it out annually before. I know every payday the tobacco store gets me for nearly thirty bucks, and that figure came to $780. One thirteen dollar can a week comes to $676.
Pardon, me it’s time to go outside and smoke one, now.
I think I smoke about an average amount of an average brand. $37/carton Winston, 52 cartons a year. $1924 a year in cigs in Ohio.
Huh. It’s only 2 mortgage payments…
According to something another poster said in another thread, cartons are over $50 in Massachussetts! Ack!
When I smoked (stopped Sept. 04), brand name cartons were $38 a piece at the smoke shops, which always had the best prices. I always said I smoked a pack a day, but on average it was probably slightly worse – let’s say four cartons (of ten packs) per month. So… $152 per month. I’m young enough that there weren’t any auxiliary expenses, like oxygen bottles or extra doctor visits, but I hear that that can be an additional expense.
Now I’ll sometimes have a cigar, because someone gave me one that wasn’t crappy one time and it was kind of nice and not addicting. Unfortunately as I know nothing about cigars, I try to get the same ones and they cost from $15 to $20 each, but at least $30 to $40 per month is better than $152, and cigars are at least enjoyable rather than a pill to stop the feeling of needing a cigarette.
I buy my smokes thru the internet. $26 per carton of Basics. I order six at a time to make the most of the shipping charge. $164.44 about every 5 weeks. That’s for hub and I. If you want good prices, you’ve gotta buy online. <commercial link removed> If anybody tries them, please use my username as the reference and we’ll both get a $10 credit!
It costs me over $10 a day. Three packs a day @ an average of $3.50 a pack.
I think the cheapest smokes here run about $2-2.50 a pack.
I find a tremendous difference in taste between my Kools, and generic. Actually, a tremendous difference between them and any other menthol. As mentioned above, most smokers are extremely brand loyal.
We spend about a hundred bucks a week on smokes.
I did this until the state called me up and said I had to pay taxes on them. We got off that train at the next stop.
Doing the math from my little Ciggie program.( Silkquit), I find that I will have saved a bit over 3000 canadian dollars at the end of a year. Consulting this little program each day or so is a really positive reinforcement for me. I was handrolling for the last few years of my smoking, because of the cost. Canadian cigs are around 7 dollars or more a pack. when I began, Cigs were a buck a pack, American.(I’m from the States) Oy. 3000 :eek:
I miss them. I don’t miss paying that much to kill myself…very…slowly…
I average about a pack every 2 days. I’ve been getting my cigarettes for 3.34 a pack including tax, so about 600 a year. Though I’m not opposed to buying something else if it’s cheaper. I don’t find that brand really matters too much, I’m just as happy with a marlboro, camel, storebrand, whatever. There’s only a few truly bad ones that I wouldn’t smoke if they were free.
Just FYI, I believe that the biggest chunk of cigarette cost are the taxes. So the cost of a pack of Marlboro Reds can vary by a lot depending on what state (and maybe even city) you’re buying them in.
I go through 3-4 packs a week, at around $4.50 - $5 a pack (prices fluctuate a bit depending on which store I happen to stop in at, whether they’re running a sale on my brand, etc). So I’m spending around $865 a year.
Honestly? I’m intrigued. I’ve heard varying stories of states coming for the tax, but never met someone who actually experienced it. What happened, how did they threaten you, did you pay? How did they find you?
Please advise…now I’m paranoid! Not really, been doing it for years here in CA, I’d like to see the state provide an accurate amount that I owe. I have shopped several different sites and it would probably be complicated for anybody to determine what I’ve purchased over the past three years.
One pack every five days at four dollars a pack = about $288 a year. It’s worth it to me. I don’t know how people can even get through three packs a day! I guess consumption goes up if you smoke in your house (I don’t), but still, you really have to be sucking them down 24/7 to get to that level. I’m not dissing anyone, I’m just amazed.
If this turns out to be legit (I also don’t want to get called up by the skeery gummint), I’ll look into it and use your name.
My wife mentioned to me that some people save money by handrolling.
How does that work? Is the tax structure different for loose tobacco?
Do you get more tobacco per dollar loose?
Are you just rolling underfilled cigs?
Handrolling tobacco is considerably cheaper - I’m pretty sure it’s taxed at a different rate to ready-rolled fags (at least in the UK). And of course one can choose to make the cigarettes as horribly slender as they choose to stretch the pack.
Also, I think it only fair that when calculating the annual cost of smoking, one deducts from this total the price of snackfoods one otherwise would have eaten to satisfy oral cravings…
Definetely cheaper. I genuinely prefer role-ups anyway. And I do roll them really skinny. When I was in the US my handrolling skills where either a minor tourist attraction (how quaint!) or they thought I was rolling a spliff.
I get lost in the math because I often get tobacco from different countries (I work in an international company so whoever travels home brings some round) but a 50gram pack will last me more than a month (and I have to sometimes put apple peel in to keep it moist).
As an aside. I personally think horrible diseases are a great reason to quit but cost really isn’t. After all, I never hear anyone say anything about how much money I could save by stopping to go to the pool which, is my case, costs me at least three times as much as the smoking.