Review Of "The Price Of Smoking" By F. A. Sloan

Document Type

Book Review

Publication Date

7-1-2005

Published In

Choice

Abstract

The Price of Smoking offers an extremely comprehensive and sometimes surprising examination of the costs of smoking; it structures the analysis around the costs likely to be incurred over a lifetime of smoking by a 24-year-old smoker (looking separately at males and females). Included in the analysis are the smoker's private costs (related to disability, earnings, morbidity, and mortality) as well as costs imposed on family members and society. Although their focus is on the costs of smoking, the authors (academicians at Duke Univ. and the Univ. of South Florida) do offer some interesting discussion of the possible sources of benefits to smokers. They highlight those findings that are surprising in light of the existing empirical literature on smoking. Although they too find that costs are large, they note that their measurement of the effects on Medicare and Medicaid are lower than commonly accepted. Also of value is their accessible, thorough discussion of how to measure the costs of smoking. Because of its emphasis on costs rather than the full picture of costs and benefits, this excellent book would not be the best introduction to the economics of smoking; however, it belongs in more comprehensive collections on smoking behavior, costs, and policy. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All collections.

Comments

This work is freely available courtesy of Choice Reviews. The review has been reproduced in full in the abstract field.

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