Smoking inequality across ethnicity and age classes: evidence from Vietnamese data

This paper is set out to investigate the link between different socio-economic factors and smoking behaviour of Vietnamese population. Using the data collected in the Global Aduts Tobacco Survey that was carried out in Vietnam by the World Health Organization, the paper manages to identify the socio-demographic characters that play a role in determining smoking inequality in the country. In order to extract the specific data needed for this paper, we first applied the Erreygers Concentration Index to determine whether smoking behaviour is more prevalent among richer of poorer group of the population. Then we use the probit model to identify specific factors that contribute to smoking inequality in the country over the chosen course. In the end, the thesis reveal that smoking habit is more prevalent among poorer part of the population and in two considered years there is no clear sign of reduction in smoking prevalence. In fact, we found out that Vietnam is in the second stage of smoking epidemic where smoking habit is increasing for both men and women, in which male smokers has always been higher than its femal counterpart.