Tobacco Settlement

I can cite numerous reasons and excuses why I took up smoking at age 30, but I wouldn't advise anyone else to do likewise. Because of it, I payed attention to the arguments when the states sued the tobacco companies several years ago. I thought then and still think now that the courts should not have awarded the states a dime.
Everybody dies whether or not he/she smokes. The terminal diseases of non-smokers are essentially as expensive as those of smokers. Therefore, smoking doesn't significantly increase a person's draw on the government's health-care purse. Smoking shortens life expectancy by a few years, so the duration of the smoker's draw on the health-care purse is shorter than that of the non-smoker. The large taxes on tobacco pay for much of the state's health-care expense drawn by smokers, so the state probably comes out better with smokers than with non-smokers.
And the federal government makes out like a bandit, with smokers paying high taxes on tobacco and paying into social security for years and then dying prematurely thereby relieving social security of several payout years.
Perhaps the tobacco companies should sue the state and federal governments to recover some of the extra revenues and expense savings incident to smoking.