We study the spillover effects of prescription drug monitoring programs (PDMPs) on crime, and in the process inform how policies that restrict access to Rx opioids per se within the healthcare system would impact broader non-health domains. In response to the substantial increase in opioid use...

We attribute the recent quadrupling of heroin death rates to the August, 2010 reformulation of an oft-abused prescription opioid, OxyContin. The new abuse-deterrent formulation led many consumers to substitute to an inexpensive alternative, heroin. Using structural break techniques and variation...

The purpose of this study is to examine the question of whether alcohol or drug use causes teenagers to engage in violent behaviors as measured by physical fighting, carrying a gun, or carrying other types of weapons. Simple OLS estimation of the effects of drug and alcohol consumption on...

We investigate the effect of teenage driving on mortality and risky behaviors in the United States using a regression discontinuity design. We estimate that motor vehicle fatalities rise by 40% at the minimum legal driving age cutoff, implying a mortality risk per additional mile driven 6-9...

This study provides the first evidence on the effects of U.S. state-level private and public insurance expansions on specialty substance use disorder (SUD) treatment use among children ages 12 to 18. We examine both private and public expansions over the period 1996 to 2010. Public insurance...

Previous studies, by relying on nationally representative surveys, have overlooked the important fact that use of addictive substances is not uniformly distributed; subgroups of hardcore users account for most of the drug consumption. This study employs the Drug Use Forecasting system to analyze...

We examine the relationship between marijuana use and non-drug related crime using data on arrests from the Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring (ADAM) Program and Uniform Crime Reports. There is a positive association between self-reported use at the time of the offence and non-drug related violent,...

This purpose of this paper is to examine the causal impact of substance use on risky sexual behaviors by teenagers. Risky sexual behaviors, which include unprotected sex and multiple partners, are highly correlated with alcohol and illicit drug use, although the nature of the causal relationship...

We assess whether in utero exposure to legalized abortion in the early 1970's affected individuals' propensities to use controlled substances as adolescents. We exploit the fact that some states legalized abortion before national legalization in 1973 to compare differences in substance use for...