March 12, 2007
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How the deuce does the cigarette industry stay in business? Have you priced those things recently?
I was at Tom Thumb sending Svetlana a little Women’s Day moolah (a holiday that really ought to receive greater recognition over here, BTW) when a man waiting next to me exclaimed “Over five bucks for a pack of smokes? You’re kidding!”
Looked behind the employee working on the Western Union transaction to where the cigarettes were kept on the back wall, and by jingo, he was right as rain…prices for individual packs ranged from generics going for a bit under $4 to $5 and change.
I remember when that’d buy an entire carton!
How are smokers able to finance their habit? That’s a crazy stupid price to pay for something that’s just gonna go up in smoke.
Going to pay that kind of money, at least buy chocolate. You know…something with staying power.
Comments (4)
I was skinnier when smoking was my vice. Chocolate is cheaper to the pocket but not the fanny. I used to pay 1.59 for basic cigs.
It’s an addiction or something like it, I guess. You pay what it costs.
What I can’t figure out is how people start.
Most people start as teenagers, am I correct?
And why should teenagers have so much money that that amount can just be thrown around to go up in smoke?
Shouldn’t that be about half or at most a third of their weekly allowance, provided they’re spending a lot of time being useful, in which case they wouldn’t have much opportunity to sneak off and buy smokes, let alone smoke them?
Guess an addiction like that is a greeat motivation to find work. :>p
I used to volunteer at a food bank. It was highly annoying when women, reeking of cigarettes, came in to get food for their families. They could afford ciggies but not food.
Apparently if you don’t start smoking by 21, you never will. Teens think it’s cool to smoke, and money doesn’t seem to be a problem. And they can’t imagine having health problems. Not them.