Tobacco control and obesity: evidence from a cross section of countries

Abstract

Although several studies of highly developed countries find tobacco control efforts impact obesity rates, whether such results extend to less developed countries is unclear. Accordingly, this study re-examines this issue by using data from countries that lie across the development spectrum. Similar to the existing literature, evidence suggests higher cigarette prices increase the per cent of the population that is overweight or obese. Yet, other tobacco control efforts have less influence. A number of other factors, including health-care expenditure, urban concentration and undernourishment, are also found to influence population weight.

Keywords:

• tobacco control
• obesity
• BMI
• cross section

JEL Classification:

• I10
• I18

Notes

¹ For example, a number of studies (e.g. Chou et al., 2004; Rashad and Grossman, 2004; Baum, 2009) find rising obesity rates are an unintended consequence of increasing taxes on cigarettes, whilst other studies (e.g. Gruber and Frakes, 2006; Nonnemaker et al., 2009) fail to find such a link.

² A number of studies (e.g. Meier et al., 1997; Saffer and Chaloupka, 2000; Yurekli and Zhang, 2000) find smoking bans, advertising bans and warning labels reduce the demand for cigarettes. Accordingly, reductions in smoking prevalence resulting from such policies could also increase obesity. Indeed, Liu et al. (2010) find that workplace smoking bans in the United States contribute to rising obesity rates.

³ Chou et al. (2004) and Gruber and Frakes (2006) find obesity rates are lower in higher income households, which could reflect the greater ability of wealthier households to have more healthy diets.

⁴ To put these results in context, the elasticity of each BMI rate with respect to the cigarette price was calculated at the mean. The average of the female and male elasticities corresponding to BMI ≥ 25 is 0.15, while for BMI ≥ 30 the average elasticity is 0.22. Hence, a given percentage increase in the price of cigarettes has the greatest impact on the population considered obese.