[perihelions]

Cigarette cartons are an unintuitively good currency object. They're high-density ($/volume or weight), storable, non-perishable, sub-dividable ("packs" in "cartons", I think that's how they're subdivided?). They're easy to count. They come in standard, audited sizes, the trusted-brand manufacturers certifying their weight (?) and stuff. The large population of tobacco addicts guarantees a stable demand, hence a stable value.

e.g. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1987/08/29/...

(From a 30,000-foot view, it's kind of analogous to cryptocurrency. In a failed state, you don't accept cigarettes as payment because you want to smoke them—but because you know you can exchange them again to someone else, and to someone else, eventually reaching a smoker, who creates the demand sink. Similarly, people accept cryptocurrency units because they know at the end of the commerce chain, there will be drug dealers guaranteeing an intrinsic demand).

[ta988]

There are a lot of fakes. Tax stamp traficking is a common thing. And it is much much less dense than a bill or a piece of precious metal.

[Kamq]

Are there a lot of fakes in the sense that they don't contain nicotine? Because that's the main utility in cigarettes.

Also, how is tax stamp trafficking relevant to a grey-market barter system?

[ta988]

Fakes in the sense of much lower quality tobacco, often mixed with cheaper materials to bulk them and in lower amounts. So people get a product at black market price that is not the expected one.

Tax stamp trafficking is used to cover for those fakes as it make them look real, and it is also used to avoid getting arrested for selling contraband.

[brewtide]

Reminds me of the articles a decade ago or so about using tide laundry detergent for the same reason.

An example: https://nymag.com/news/features/tide-detergent-drugs-2013-1/

Edit: tide, not ride.