The Economic Cost of Smoking: Differences in Wages between Smokers and Non-smokers in Russia

This paper estimates the economic losses related to the negative effect of smoking on wages in Russia. Data from the 2006 Living Standards Survey of Russia’s Tomsk region are used to jointly estimate a system of three equations: the smoking decision equation and two separate equations for wages of smokers and non-smokers. The results show that, after controlling for observed characteristics and taking into account unobserved heterogeneity in personal characteristics, smoking has a substantial negative impact on wages of working men in Russia. It has been also shown that the effect of smoking on wages differs between males and females.