The percentage of U.S. adults saying they smoked cigarettes in the past week, now 21%, is similar to what Gallup found in 2007. However, it represents a decline from earlier this decade, when between 22% and 28% said they smoked, and is among the lowest figures Gallup has recorded in more than six decades of polling on tobacco use in America.
Woman and Cigarette
More specifically, in three of the past four Gallup smoking measurements (conducted between July 2007 and today), only 20% or 21% of American adults have said they smoked cigarettes in the past week. Compared with the average of 25% who said they smoked from 2000 through 2006, this suggests a recent decline in U.S. smoking.
The latest result comes from Gallup’s annual Consumption Habits survey, conducted July 10-13, 2008.
Self-reported adult smoking peaked in 1954 at 45%, and remained at 40% or more through the early 1970s, but has since gradually declined. The average rate of smoking across the decades fell from 40% in the 1970s to 32% in the 1980s, 26% in the 1990s, and 24% since 2000.
A Youthful Habit
Cigarette smoking is more prevalent among younger adults (18 to 49 years) than among older adults and seniors, something Gallup has seen consistently over the years. Thirty percent of 18- to 29-year-olds and 26% of those 30 to 49 say they had a cigarette in the past week. This contrasts with only 17% of those 50 to 64 and 9% of those 65 and older.
A major reason for the difference in smoking rates by age is that many older Americans have quit the habit. For nearly every current smoker in the 30- to 49-year age bracket, there is another who says he or she used to smoke. Among those 50 to 64, the ratio of former smokers to current smokers is nearly 2-to-1, while among those 65 and older it swells to more than 5-to-1.
As a result, a greater proportion of seniors have “ever” smoked (56%), compared with young adults (42%).
Presumably, the older age brackets would include even more current and former smokers relative to the younger age brackets, if not for the disproportionately higher rate of deaths among older Americans because of tobacco use.
Smoking rates have been coming down for about the past quarter century, and recent Gallup polling suggests they have continued to drop in just the past few years. About one in five Americans today say they smoke cigarettes, down from about one in four at the start of the decade.
Although most smokers feel they are addicted to cigarettes, that fact that so many older adults have reportedly succeeded in quitting should give young smokers who want to quit the encouragement to try.
