Death by fire has declined significantly over the past 100 years, but there’s one surprising policy that may actually increase the prevalence of fires: smoking restrictions and bans. A new paper by Emory economist Sara Markowitz finds that “laws regulating indoor smoking are associated with increases in some types of fires. Specifically, workplace restrictions and bans are associated with increases in fires in all locations and in residential units. Restaurant and bar bans are associated with increases in fires in restaurants and all eating/drinking establishments.” Markowitz explains the counterintuitive results: “Even when bans are effective in reducing smoking, if the reduction is mostly among the safe smokers and the remaining smokers act more carelessly, then we could easily see an increase in fires.” For example, “In the case of restaurants and bars, it is easy to imagine a person going outside to smoke and then improperly disposing of the cigarette in flammable material such as mulch or shrubbery.” [%comments]
Do Smoking Bans Lead to More Fires?
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That exact situation happened where I work. All smoking was banned on company property. Smokers would go off property to another building. That building owner complained and so a co-worker ( who will forever remain anonymous) started smoking in a corner of our building with low visibility, threw a cigarette in the bushes and created a fairly large conflagration.
A small price to pay to be free of second hand smoke.
Nicotine tests for everyone entering establishments. Don’t even let the smokers on the property.
The single greatest factor in the decline of house fires in the past 100 years ws the Electrification of America. Candle chandaliers, candles balanced on Christmas tree boughs, candles by the bedstand, open fires, torches, coal filled bed warmers all got replaced by safer electrical no-flame devices. And even our lungs benefited from less fires–not smoking related.
Fireman today rarely respond to fires… they probably bar-b-que more. Mostly they polish the firetruck and cook ribeyes. Nearly 80% of calls are medical related including auto accidents, heart attacks, and fallen- down -and- I -can’t-get-up calls. That is why fire departments are trying to realign themselves as relevant as a terrorism response, Chemical-biological-nuclear units.
Smokers are the persistent ‘ fly in the chardonnay.’
–The Real Cash McDollar
That’d be socialism to the extreme, Mr. McDollar.
This probably causes a rise in grass fires along highways as car manufacturers remove in car ashtrays for the ones which are afterthoughts that fit into cup holders so more smokers throw cigarette butts out the window..
You somehow neglect to mention another important finding:
“Results indicate that reductions in smoking and increases in cigarette prices are associated with fewer fires.”
Not much bias here, oh no.
It’s 21st century. Why on earth has nobody figured out a technology to eliminate second-hand smoke while letting smokers ruin their lungs in peace? It is pathetic that resources get wasted on moronic projects like flights to Mars when simple and relevant issues like this remain unresolved.