Thursday, February 17, 2011

Smoking as an inferior good

Read this post and take a look at the numbers. Then post to THIS blog an explanation of why you think that this is the case. Try not to just repeat what others say.
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9 comments:

  1. AnonymousFebruary 21, 2011 at 10:46 AM

    DJ Jones

    A popular reason for smoking is to relieve stress. Generally speaking, high income people don't carry the stress load as the bottom of the income chart. Along with low income comes minimum wage jobs or a little better, and many people take smoke breaks as we've all seen. It is surprising to see the numbers how how much a person who smokes a pack a day, since that is a larger amount of money to the bottom of the chart than it is to the top of the chart.

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  2. AliFebruary 22, 2011 at 6:14 AM

    People with lower income are mores stressed from financial issues. People with a higher income are less stressed out, so they smoke less. People who graduate from college are, for the most part, financially better off so their stress level is lower than the people who only have a high school diploma, or were high school drop outs.

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  3. AnonymousFebruary 22, 2011 at 6:46 AM

    Julia Nini

    I think that people who receive a lower income constantly think about how and when to spend it. If a person was perhaps working two jobs, they would be more prone to stress than another person making a good living at one job. There are many people who need to pay for their children as well as necessities such as food, clothing, etc. These people tend to alleviate their stress by means of smoking. Also, smoking is more apparent in children who have not received a high school degree. This is because the stress level in these people is much higher than that of a child attending college. They realize that they do not have an education and therefore, it will be more difficult for them to find a secure job. This may increase the smoking rate.

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  4. UnknownFebruary 22, 2011 at 6:47 AM

    Cigarette use in America's lowest social class is probably financially linked. Drug use in the population below the poverty line is more prevalent than that of the $90,000+. I think that the increase in drug use leads to people doing other negative things to there body. Cigarettes have an effect to relieve stress, which can be attributed to drug withdrawal.

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  5. AnonymousFebruary 22, 2011 at 7:10 AM

    Temi Oyinlola

    Most of the time people with a lower income don't have as great of an education compared to people with a higher income. This means they might not have been educated on the true effects of smoking and continue to smoke without knowing the actual negative effects. Other reasons may be financial or regular stress and smoking tends to relieve stress. Also, some people with a lower income don't consider how prices can add up and only consider cigarette prices in the "now."

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  6. AnonymousFebruary 22, 2011 at 12:28 PM

    Hayley Hansson

    The people with higher incomes see the long term losses in smoking, and they, in many cases, have the better education and know the toll smoking could take on their household incomes. Less educated people see the smoking benefits (stress relief ect.) and losses (5 dollars, health) only in the short term. This may be the link to why more lower paying jobs offer regular, scheduled smoking breaks, while less better paying jobs do.

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  7. lroysFebruary 22, 2011 at 5:06 PM

    The chart shows that the highest percentage saying "yes" is with people living in a lower income environment with less education. The reason for this is because people living in these environments are more susceptible to stress and issues (money problems, depression) because they do not have as many opportunities as the people who live in a wealthy environment with education. Cigarettes relieve stress, and they are easy to come by, giving these people the ability to "have a smoke" whenever they are stressed.

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  8. AnonymousFebruary 22, 2011 at 7:31 PM

    Mimi

    I think that the main cause for the lower income people smoking more cigarettes is because they want to be able to show others that they are wealthy and by doing this they purchase cigarettes. Because cigarettes are so expensive, you obviously have to have a little bit of money in order to afford them. I think that the people that go on with there life and get better educations are more successful and make more money. Because they are making more money, they know they are not low income people and do not feel the need to show off their money by smoking cigarettes.

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  9. Rachel RFebruary 22, 2011 at 8:13 PM

    I think that education plays a serious role in the purchase of cigarettes as the majority of people purchasing cigarettes do not have a strong education. Considering that they might not have any knowledge about the effects of smoking cigarettes, they don't see the problem in smoking them. Though they are tight on budget, they probably manage their money in a way that allows them to fit cigarettes in, thus giving something else up that lets say someone who makes 90,000+ dollars a year couldn't.

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