Washington Ranks Among States With Highest Costs To Smoke

Smoking is an expensive habit in every state and Washington is no exception.

Whether it’s the simple out-of-pocket cost of routinely buying a pack of cigarettes — or health-care or potential loss of income — the real price of smoking approaches $50,000 annually in the most expensive states.

The personal finance website WalletHub recently released its analysis on the “Real Cost of Smoking by State.”

Washington ranked as the 10th most expensive on the overall list.

• Total Cost per Smoker: $39,591
• Out-of-Pocket Cost: $3,019
• Financial Opportunity Cost: $26,463
• Health-Care Cost per Smoker: $3,923
• Income Loss per Smoker: $5,926
• Other Costs per Smoker: $261

“Smoking doesn’t just ruin your health. It can also burn a nasty hole through your wallet,” analysts wrote in the study released this week.

The overall annual price tag on smoking in the United States? Every year, smoking costs America more than $300 billion, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

New York ranked as the most expensive state in the nation for smokers, according to WalletHub. Connecticut and Washington D.C., are the next on the list.

On the other end of the financial spectrum, North Carolina ranked as the cheapest state for smokers in the United States. The bottom five least expensive were rounded out by Georgia, Missouri, Mississippi and South Carolina.

Here are the 10 most expensive states annually for smokers:

1. New York
2. Connecticut
3. District of Columbia
4. Massachusetts
5. Rhode Island
6. Alaska
7. Hawaii
8. Minnesota
9. Vermont
10. Washington

The full report on the real cost of smoking is available at WalletHub.