We evaluate the health effects of a reduction in New Zealand's minimum legal purchase age for alcohol. Difference-in-differences (DD) estimates show a substantial increase in alcohol-related hospitalizations among those newly eligible to purchase liquor, around 24.6% (s.e.=5.5%) for males and...

In this paper, we examine the effects of recent parental Medicaid eligibility expansions on Medicaid participation and private insurance coverage. We present a new approach for estimating these policy effects that explicitly models the particular policy instrument over which legislators have...

I exploit the age-based eligibility structure of Medicare and the age gap between spouses to examine the impact of Medicare eligibility of an older spouse on the insurance coverage of younger, Medicare-ineligible spouses. Using a regression discontinuity framework, I find that Medicare...

The last time that federal excise taxes on alcoholic beverages were increased was 1991. The changes were larger than the typical state-level changes that have been used to study price effects, but the consequences have not been assessed due to the lack of a control group. Here we develop and...

We consider the effect of legal access to alcohol on student achievement. Our preferred approach identifies the effect through changes in one's performance after gaining legal access to alcohol, controlling flexibly for the expected evolution of grades as one makes progress towards their degree....

In this paper, I examine the impact of uninsured patients on the in-hospital mortality rate of insured heart attack patients. I employ panel data models using patient discharge and hospital financial data from California (1999–2006). My results indicate that uninsured patients have an...

This paper exploits the discontinuity created by the minimum legal drinking age of 21 years to estimate the causal effect of increased alcohol availability on marijuana use. We find that consumption of marijuana decreases sharply at age 21, while consumption of alcohol increases, suggesting that...

We analyze the effect of an individual insurance mandate (Medicare Levy Surcharge) on the demand for private health insurance (PHI) in Australia. With administrative income tax return data, we show that the mandate has several distinct effects on taxpayers’ behavior. First, despite the large...

This paper uses an unusual administrative dataset covering the universe of French hospitals to consider hospital employment: this is consistently higher in public hospitals than in not-for-profit (NFP) or private hospitals, even controlling for a number of measures of hospital output. NFP...

Legal bar closing times in England and Wales have historically been early and uniform. Recent legislation liberalised closing times with the object of reducing social problems thought associated with drinking to “beat the clock.” Indeed, using both difference in difference and synthetic...