Want to save some money?

By Lissa Wohltmann

I know you’re not smoking, otherwise you’d be reading the “Bad Breath Blog” instead a Healthy Tips blog. However, chances are you know someone that still hangs out with Marlboro man (oh wait, he died of lung cancer), the Camel Comic, or whoever is popular with pushing poison to the population that is most pointedly vulnerable. Ask them if they are so rich then why not throw a little cash your way? After all, they are burning up some serious currency. Therefore, just for you, I crunched the numbers and came up with some surprising facts.

Based on a 2-pack-a-day habit ($5/pack), using a modest 6 percent interest rate compounded monthly, a former smoker could save $3,875 the first year of non-smoking, $4,114 the second year of non-smoking and $4,368 the third year. This does not include reinvestment of the $12,357 saved in three years of not smoking. Your friend’s financial health will improve along with his or her physical health. That $12,357 savings does not even account for the opportunity costs you lose out on when you could spend that money elsewhere. Heck, you could have bought 12,000 lottery tickets and won the big payout of maybe a cool $5 million. Think about it. Is smoking really worth $5 million?