Re:Life Expectancy in Europe Compared to the US
by wk_end on Friday June 27, 2025 @08:51AM
(#44396417)
I don’t think your link is showing what you want it to show - it’s showing costs, but not necessarily any sort of counterfactual delta AFAICT.
There’s been a number of studies on this, and they do seem to suggest that overall smoking saves society money. E.g. here’s one from Finland
This is often mentioned, but it's simply not true. It's not old age itself that costs money, it's the part of your life where you need care and support. This is old age in otherwise healthy people, but smokers don't just drop dead one day, they go through as many if not more years of care and support as everyone else, they just do it younger (which costs in lost productive years too).
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cost-of-smoking-t...