Transparency is extremely important to us, so we are letting you know that we may receive a commission on some of links you click on from this page. See our disclaimer.

As businesses consider which aspects of employee wellness to focus on, the results from a recent Gallup survey show that they may want to begin with smoking.

The report concludes that “Workers who smoke cost the U.S. economy an estimated $278 billion annually in lost productivity due to absenteeism and extra healthcare costs. This figure is based on an analysis of the cost of extra missed workdays due to poor health, partial absenteeism due to smoke breaks, and additional healthcare costs compared with workers who do not smoke.”

The data come from “more than 67,000 interviews conducted as part of the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index from Jan. 2-Aug. 21, 2013, with American adults who work at least one hour or more per week.”

Some good news: The number of smokers is dropping. Gallup reports that “Smoking rates among U.S. adults dropped steadily from highs of around 45% in 1950 to 22% in 2005. Since that time, however, the decline in smoking has abated, with the national smoking rate staying in the 20% to 21% range consistently since Gallup and Healthways initiated the Well-Being Index in in 2008. The percentage of workers who smoke has consistently hovered just slightly below the overall rate.”

But the bottom line for employers is clear: “As employers increasingly engage in improving the health of their workers, smoking cessation programs continue to represent a substantial means of reducing healthcare costs and absenteeism. Although other wellbeing-based programs can and should be embraced, the critical issue of reducing smoking in the workforce endures as a high return on investment for employers.”