We all realize that smoking is bad for one’s health. Actually in the evaluation of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention tobacco use causes more than 5 million deaths each year across the planet. About smokers die 10 years before nonsmokers do. So as 2014 has already begun, if you’ve determined to quit smoking as one of your resolutions, consider the following costs of smoking as further motivation to quit smoking.

Smoking Causes Huge Opportunity Costs:

Smoking is a high-priced habit. Buying and using one pack of cigarettes every day the average smoker spends about $2,500 a year. Those funds should be put to work paying off your home loan, college loans or credit balances, helping to enhance your personal finances. But the opportunity costs are much bigger when you look at the future.

The average yearlong return for the S&P 500 including the Great Depression and Great Recession is 7.81% in the past 20 years. If you invested $2,500 each and every year over 20 years you could have $140,000. Invest $2,500 annually for 30 years and the potential return is closer to $350,000. Put those same funds to work using an advanced financial publication service like what Summerland Associates offers and the total could be in the millions.

Smoking Creates Expensive Insurance Costs:

Smoking also increases the price of insurance premiums. As discussed earlier, smokers die at an earlier age than nonsmokers do. As a consequence, your life insurance premium could be twice what a nonsmoker would pay. That amount can equate to thousands of dollars per year. Smokers also have more medical issues than nonsmokers do so you will have to ante up more for health insurance. According to a featured article in Forbes, insurance firms can charge smokers 50 % more than they charge nonsmokers under the Affordable Care Act.

Owners insurance is also more expensive for smokers. Statistical data are clear: people who smoke have house fires more frequently than folk who don't. That fact leads to higher insurance premiums. Statistical info also demonstrate that smokers get into more automobile crashes than nonsmokers. This means a rise in auto insurance rates also.

The Damage Smoking Causes Requires Expensive Drugs and Medical Intervention

Smoking harms nearly all organs in the body in the in the opinion of the Center for Disease Control. In the process it seriously adds to your likelihood of developing coronary heart problems, peripheral vascular sickness protracted bronchitis emphysema and a range of cancers. The care for these conditions may need costly medicines and hospitalization. In the opinion of the American Lung Association smoking costs the U. S. $96 bn. in direct health care expenditures in 2004 or an average of $4,260 per adult smoker.

If you're a smoker you have lots of financial incentive to quit smoking in 2014. While the health benefits are the best for individuals that give up smoking earlier, you can cut your possibility of disease and death irrespective of age. It will likely not be straightforward to do as the nicotine in cigarettes is as addictive as heroin, cocaine, and alcohol but it is feasible. Be certain to visit the CDC web site for motivating stories and tips and communicate with your doctor about smoking cessation programs available through your health insurer.

After you've successfully quit be certain to talk with your insurance professional about possible nonsmoker premium reductions on all your insurance products. Finally put that extra capital to work. Pay off debt. Save for a holiday. Put more into your IRA. The sky is the limit!

John A. Larsen, the Managing Director of Summerland Associates, LLC, has worked in financial services for 20 years beginning in banking. John has held Series 7, 63, and insurance licenses working with high net worth clients to craft better portfolios. John has spent the last 10 years refining advanced investment concepts into a series of applied methods that drive the Summerland Alerts. More articles can be found on Summerland Associates internet site or via Wealth Building Ideas, made availalbe for iPads.