Not only do smokers have to contend with frequent price hikes and steep duties for their increasingly expensive habit, but they are also likely to earn less than peers who abstain, according to a new study.
But many can be persuaded to quit by a mix of what some researchers call “rewards and financial incentives”, according to a separate study.
A team from the University of Jyvaskyla in Finland found that young adults who smoked saw their earning power take a hit when compared with work colleagues who stay at their desks rather than nipping outside for a nicotine hit.
However, a team of researchers from the UK’s University of East Anglia, University of Oxford and University of Edinburgh, and from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in the US, said there is strong evidence that money, vouchers or deposits given in workplace or community schemes “can be used to encourage people to quit smoking, and to reward them if they remain smoke-free”.
The Finland-based team used a measurement known as “pack years”, which they described as a “standard measure of cumulative tobacco exposure” calculated by multiplying the average daily cigarettes smoked by the person’s age minus the age the person started smoking.