[CoolestBeans]

Smoking reduces quality years of life and puts a burden on a nation's health system. The drastic decrease in productivity in a nation from those two things has got to be far more than any increase from any cognitive benefits.

But more importantly, it's morally wrong to suggest we shorten and make our lives worse for some short term stimulant spike.

[tschwimmer]

Many studies actually show that smokers are cheaper to care for over their lifetimes, likely because they die earlier. This study[0] shows a +7% for men/+4% for women increase in healthcare costs if all people stopped smoking. I'm too lazy to vet the epistemological quality of this study, but it seems like there are a bunch of these much along the same lines. One thing these studies seem to neglect is total value lost associated with smoking, instead focusing costs alone. By folding in some QALY-like model, you could come up with the overall impact of smoking on society in quantitative terms.

[0]https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9321534/

[glimshe]

This number doesn't take into consideration the contributions of these people to society, which could outweigh their additional healthcare cost and make them an actual net positive to the economy (putting aside moral questions about calculating whether people should live or die based on their net value).

[flappyeagle]

Why does this matter? It’s definitionally the least productive years of someone’s life outside of childhood.

[peapicker]

A nearly 80 yr old man I know has a nearly 200k per year pension. Every five years he lives adds 1 million to the economy.

[CogitoCogito]

If by “add 1 million to the economy”, you mean the local economy where the 80 year old lives, then sure I guess. But in general that’s just money moving around.

[qwytw]

How does that work? I mean technically he takes 200k from the economy without producing anything in return. In very basic terms the government printing an extra 200k adds about as much value (assuming he's not actively investing and not doing anything else).

[matthewdgreen]

If he was “actively investing” would that change the situation?

[glimshe]

Many cancers triggered by smoking hit during late working years.

[qwytw]

From a purely utilitarian/dystopian/evil/etc. point of view: aren't most people suffering much older on average?

e.g. in the median age at diagnosis is ~71. Most people at that age have very low productivity live on a pension/from savings/other passive income and economically probably cost more to the society than they contribute.

[rcme]

Smokers also pay more taxes over their lifetime so they contribute more to society in addition to costing less at the end of their life.

[tmn]

Is it morally wrong to eat a cupcake? I’m not a smoker nor would I want anyone I care about to smoke, but have you thought through the extrapolation of your assertion?

Similarly, old people are a drag on society. It’s not at all clear that reducing lifespan is a decrease on net productivity.

I would not want those I care about to die early, nor would I deny anyone else the same hope for the sake of productivity. But I can be objective enough to acknowledge the tradeoffs.

[peoplefromibiza]

>Smoking reduces quality years of life

actually it make worse your worst year, but has no effect on your best years

> and puts a burden on a nation's health system.

listen, I know smocking is bad as anyone else, but if we wanna talk about "burden on a nation's health system" let's talk about cars (fumes are just the tip of the iceberg, we have more than 20 thousand deaths/year caused by car accidents and many more injured and/or left invalid) or having children.

You know what also puts a burden on on a nation's health system?

an aging population!

in my Country more than 25% of the population is over 65, so they not only are retired and do not contribute anymore to the expenditures through their work, they also need a lot of very expensive and prolonged care.

They most probably smoked in their younger years, but survived nonetheless and now they need to be taken care of.

Truth is the nation health system wastes too much money on things that do not help people, we've seen it during the pandemic, the personnel was crushed by the unsustainable shifts and the output was barely sufficient.

said by someone who was born and lives in a Country with a public healthcare system, who happily pays for it through a lot of taxes (half of my salary) and a big chunk of the family employed by the aforementioned public national health care system.

Or, for example, what has been the cost (both economical and social) of the recent opioid epidemic in the US of A caused by the health care system itself?

> But more importantly, it's morally wrong to suggest we shorten and make our lives worse for some short term stimulant spike.

like, for example, firing up combustion engines to drive kids to school? kids that, bear in mind, have perfectly functioning legs and can walk!

[nisegami]

>in my Country more than 25% of the population is over 65, so they not only are retired and do not contribute anymore to the expenditures through their work, they also need a lot of very expensive and prolonged care.

If only there was something out there that could thin out this group of people in particular.

[peoplefromibiza]

> If only there was something out there that could thin out this group of people in particular.

it's the same thing that, eventually, will happen to everyone of us.

But literally where I am from they have on average 20 years more to live (second oldest Country in the World) so, regarding the burden on the national healthcare system, smokers cost less (I must specify I believe the economic angle is rather meaningless when talking about health care. I don't believe health care should ever be profitable, barely sustainable it's enough).

A study concluded that the abuse of medicines causes around 40 thousands deaths/year in my Country, which is an incredibly high number, so maybe the secret lies in moderation and not in abolition and prohibition.

There's also the fact that for many people a long meaningless life is much worse than one lived fully, as the "owner" intended.

Maybe someone in the future will convince everyone to avoid any potentially dangerous habit, but I'm also quite sure that such a society will face an epidemic of depression and suicides.