Background:
Korea raised the cigarette tax in 2014, raising the price per cigarette from 2500 won (1100 won = $1) to 4500 won. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether the effects of cigarette price increase on smoking reduction were affected by socioeconomic status and residential areas in Korean men.

Methods:
The study used Korean Community Health Surveys from 2008 to 2015. Since 2008, the Korean Community Health Survey has been conducted on 220,000 adults aged 19 or older every year. Since women in Korea have low smoking rates, this study only included men. We assessed the trends of the 8-year smoking rate change by socioeconomic status and residence area. The smoking rate was standardized by using the Korean standard population in 2005. We conducted a statistical analysis considering the complex sample survey design.

Results:
The age-standardized smoking rate declined from 48.6% in 2008 to 39.7% in 2015. From 2008 to 2014, it decreased by 1.0% each year, but decreased by 3.1% between 2014 and 2015 when the cigarette tax was raised. Smoking rate decreased by 2.5% in the group with monthly household income less than 2 million won, but decreased by 3.1% in the group with monthly household income more than 2 million won. Smoking rates decreased 2.9% in rural areas and 3.2% in urban areas. In conclusion, this study showed that the effect of reducing the smoking rate due to cigarette tax increase was higher in the high income group than in the low income group, and larger in the urban area than in the rural area.

Conclusions:
In conclusion, this study showed that smoking rate decline due to cigarette tax increase was greater in the high income group than in the low income group, and in the urban area than in the rural area.