Supporters of the FDA bill cited figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that smokers cost the country $96 billion a year in direct health care costs, and an additional $97 billion a year in lost productivity.

A White House statement supporting the bill, which awaits action in the Senate, echoed the argument by contending that tobacco use "accounts for over a $100 billion annually in financial costs to the economy."

However, smokers die some 10 years earlier than nonsmokers, according to the CDC, and those premature deaths provide a savings to Medicare, Social Security, private pensions and other programs.

Vanderbilt University economist Kip Viscusi studied the net costs of smoking-related spending and savings and found that for every pack of cigarettes smoked, the country reaps a net cost savings of 32 cents.

"It looks unpleasant or ghoulish to look at the cost savings as well as the cost increases and it's not a good thing that smoking kills people," Viscusi said in an interview. "But if you're going to follow this health-cost train all the way, you have to take into account all the effects, not just the ones you like in terms of getting your bill passed."

Viscusi worked as a litigation expert for the tobacco industry in lawsuits by states but said that his research, which has been published in peer-reviewed journals, has never been funded by industry.

Other researchers have reached similar conclusions.

A Dutch study published last year in the Public Library of Science Medicine journal said that health care costs for smokers were about $326,000 from age 20 on, compared to about $417,000 for thin and healthy people.

The reason: The thin, healthy people lived much longer.

А то, что живой человек, платит налоги включая на здравоохранение, почему не считается?

В Нидерландах вроде хорошие налоги. Хотя в 2006м у них была реформа здравоохранения, нужно всё заново пересчитывать.

про то, как работают налоговые и здравоохранительные системы у летучих голландцев мне неизвестно ничего

но тут часть логики в том, что некурящие живут дольше на пенсии, то есть на некотором иждивении общества

плюс они попросту живут дольше, то есть суммарные затраты общества на их здравоохранение выходят больше

в сша же пользовались при принятии законов другой логикой - суммарные расходы общества на здравоохранение, которые увеличиваются (и всем приходится разделять бремя) при наличии в пуле курильщиков, а также потери общества от пропущенных по болезни трудодней (курильщики чаще подвержены респираторным)