Should I have to pay for a smoker's habit?

Dallas County, in trying to get a handle on rising insurance costs, has come up with a plan. Each smoker covered by the County's insurance policies will pay $50 per month more than employees and dependents who don't smoke. Depending on how you look at it, this is either a surcharge for smoking or a discount for not smoking.

Critics of the plan say it is "lifestyle discrimination." The American Cancer Society says, "Premium discounts for healthy behavior amount to penalties for people who are less healthy." I don't look at it that way. I don't smoke. The smokers in my insurance pool increase my premiums. Why should I have to pay for their bad habits?

From another perspective, if smokers can afford $5 a pack for cigarettes, many of them buying more than one pack a day, surely they can afford a paltry $50 a month added to their insurance premiums. You can be sure that it will cost the insurance company a lot more than $600 a year when they develop cancer, heart disease, emphysema, bad sinuses, or any of the other maladies caused by tobacco.

And the final point here? No one has to pay the extra $50 per month. They just have to decide whether they'd rather smoke or get cheaper insurance.

"Where there's smoke." The Dallas Morning News; September 10, 2011; p. 1B.