[bubinubn]

Although there are plenty of studies to suggest otherwise, at least one study: http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/jou... suggests that smokers have a lifetime healthcare cost that is lower for the simple reason that they die earlier, and dying is cheap.

full disclosure: I smoke, and am thus not impartial when it comes to higher cigarette taxes.

[davidf18]

Very sorry you're a smoker. Even if one is a smoker, one should want tobacco taxes to increase because 1) it is the single best intervention to help others to quit and for youth to never start and 2) today there are negative externalities for government (employees, Medicaid, Medicare, VA, Army) and firms that hire smokers because the health insurance costs are higher than normal. That means tax money that should be going towards other things are going towards tobacco related healthcare Instead. Taxing tobacco ensures that there is not so much of a subsidy of non-smokers for smokers.

Whether overall there is health savings for smokers, while the smokers are being covered by insurance they cost substantially more money than non-smokers.