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Comment by ChrisMarshallNY | Hacker News Reader

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ChrisMarshallNY·

> Cigarettes were $5 / pack.

I quit in 1980 ($0.65/pack).

They are now close to $15/pack, in NY. I know, because I have a family member that still smokes.

This does not even touch the cost to health.

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That $5 number is suspicious to me, or perhaps just geographically skewed. In early 90s, I went to the store and bought cigarettes for my mom almost daily and I remember it being about $2.

The $5 figure was from northern British Columbia. Cigarettes were much cheaper in the U.S. at the time (Canadians used to bring back a couple of duty-free cartons on a regular basis) and in Ontario, where the government reduced the taxes to counter smuggling.

Edit: in the link below you can see that over the course of 1990, cigarette prices rose from $35 to $48/carton (so $4.80/pack if you bought them by the carton) in 1990. They were, of course, more expensive if you bought individual packs, or if you lived in the north.

https://otru.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/update_may2002.p...

I remember visiting Canada, in the 1970s, and cigarettes were about $4 a pack. Everyone used to buy big cans of Export tobacco, and roll their own. Apparently. pre-rolled cigarettes were taxed heavily, but loose tobacco was not. I think this is still the case, in many nations. I have a friend from UK, who is always smoking hand-rolled "fags."

Oh wow. Yeah definitely a US thing then. Completely makes sense, sadly.

I paid $5/pack for Nat Shermans in SF in 1994/95. IIRC there were super cheap brands for around $2 but they were skanky, Shermans and Dunhills and American Spirits were all around $4-5.

May be a NY thing. I bought Marlboros in Sunnyvale in 2016 and paid $5-6 USD per pack.

NY is insane. It's about taxes. The City is much worse than the 'burbs (about $12/pack, out here).

If I go down to MD or VA, they are about $5 less.

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