init4kicks:

For all intensive purposes, smoking is a public health threat and already costs each and every nonsmoker or future nonsmoker money without their consent. It concerns me that everytime a smoker engages in their "divine right" to shorten their life, I pay higher taxes and higher insurance premiums to cover their filthy little habit. When they post a bond for their future health care for when they lose their jobs, due to a smoking related illness, which disables them from working so that the nonsmoking taxpayers have to fund their poor lifestyle choice, maybe I will feel a bit better. Better yet, invest in their own personal bubble so they may have the pleasure of breathing their own noxious fumes instead of inflicting them on the general population. Just a thought.

Oh, please. You are not paying higher taxes because of smokers. Taxes on a pack of cigarettes exceeds the cost of the cigarettes themselves, if everyone that smokes quit, they would raise everyones taxes to make up for the lost revenue. With additional taxes on cigarettes (at least in NYS), you can figure that a smoker who smokes one pack a day pays approximately $1,500.00 a year more in taxes than the non-smoker. That is revenue that was supposed to be allocated for smoke related illnesses although it has been used to bring down deficits as opposed to raising taxes. Who do you think will have to make up those billions of dollars that the government will lose? Smokers also pay higher insurance premiums than non-smokers.

My friend has had ovarian cancer and breast cancer twice, should she have to pay a bond so that your health insurance and/or taxes won't have to be raised as she is at higher risk to lose her job (actually she is already on disability) and need a lot of health care in the future? Should alcoholics, drug addicts, obese people, people who have a family history of cancer, heart disease, diabetes, etc have to pay a bond so that your health insurance and/or taxes won't have to be raised as they are at a higher risk to lose their jobs and need a lot of health care in the future? Or is it just smokers who already pay more for their "dirty habit" which is actually considered an addiction than anyone with any other poor lifestyle choice.