If a pack of cigarettes were to cost 300 yen, 16 percent of smokers would try to kick the habit, and if the craving was to cost them 1,000 yen a pack, 63 percent would quit, according to a government-sponsored study released Tuesday.
The study, conducted by the Institute for Health Economics and Policy, an affiliate of the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, suggests that a tax bringing the price of cigarettes up to 1,000 yen a pack would also add 1 trillion yen to state coffers.
Apart from those who would quit, 30 percent of respondents in the study said they would reduce the number of cigarettes they smoke if the price of a pack of 20, now typically costing 250 yen, were hiked to 300 yen, the report says.