Over 50% of cigarettes smoked in State of New York are smuggled in.Here’s more from The New York Post:

If you’re lighting up in New York, there’s a good chance that butt was not taxed here. That’s because the “unintended consequences” of high cigarette taxes have made New York City the undisputed butt-smuggling center of the US, according to a new Tax Foundation study.

For 2015, the most recent reporting year, the state lost $1.63 billion because of untaxed sales, according to figures released by analysts for the Tax Foundation.

New York state has a state tax of $4.35 per pack, and the city adds on another $1.50.

Those astronomical cigarette taxes have driven the black market in smokes that cost the city an estimated $740 million in 2015 — and the state about $895 million on top of that — according to the Tax Foundation analysts’ calculations for The Post.

the report says, “is the highest net importer of smuggled cigarettes, totaling 56.8 percent of total cigarette consumption in the state.”