KZBlog

I caught this article on Gazeta.KZ, that the government is increasing the minimum price of cigarettes. I didn’t know there was a minimum price mandated by law. Does this mean they aren’t raising taxes? Do other goods have legal minimum prices?

The other interesting bit was that cigarettes seem to be classified by length since there is one minimum price for cigarettes that measure from 45 to 85 mm and another price for cigarettes that measure from 87.1 to 160mm in length. Which is actually quite a range, since 160mm is almost 4 times longer than 45mm.

Of course Westerners will be shocked to hear that cigarettes in Kazakhstan are so cheap. While the increase is around 33%, that comes out to 20 tenge or 13 cents. Most cigarettes currently cost between 60 and 150 tenge. Or 40 cents and $1. It’s actually quite frustrating because I quit and one suggestion for motivating yourself to quit is to sum up how much money you’ve saved and buy yourself something nice. But I’m actually spending more money on gum now than I was on cigarettes since a pack of gum is the same price as a pack of cigarettes but comes with fewer pieces!