Jan. 18. Smoking can burn a nasty hole through your wallet.

With the economic and societal costs of smoking totaling more than $600 billion per year, the personal-finance website WalletHub released its report on The Real Cost of Smoking by State.

To encourage the estimated 34.2 million tobacco users in the U.S. to kick the dangerous habit, WalletHub calculated the potential monetary losses – including the lifetime and annual costs of a cigarette pack per day, health care expenditures, income losses and other costs – brought on by smoking and exposure to secondhand smoke.

North Carolina is the fourth best state for active smokers, or worst state depending on your perspective, because of cost.

Missouri placed first as least costly, followed by eight Southern states, including North Carolina at No. 4. Four Northeast states were most costly, with the District of Columbia as the costliest.

The high price of smoking in NC

—Out-of-Pocket Cost per Smoker – $115,282 (Rank: 4th)

—Financial-Opportunity Cost per Smoker – $1,542,944 (Rank: 4th)

—Health-Care Cost per Smoker – $152,843 (Rank: 15th)

—Income Loss per Smoker – $489,387 (Rank: 12th)

—Other Costs per Smoker – $12,824 (Rank: 23rd)

—Total Cost Over Lifetime per Smoker: $2,313,279

—Total Cost per Year per Smoker: $48,193 (Rank: 4th)