The Effects of Cocaine and Heroin Prices on Drug-Related Emergency Department Visits

This paper estimates the empirical relationship between the prices of cocaine and heroin and objective indicators of use. The set of outcomes is drug related hospital emergency department admissions where cocaine and heroin are cited, for 21 large U.S. metropolitan areas. These outcomes are superior to subjective self-reports, and are policy-relevant since they directly measure a large component of the health-care costs associated with heavy or chronic drug usage. Panel data methodology is used to identify the empirical link between drug prices and these indicators. Results indicate that health consequences associated with heavy or chronic drug use are negatively related to drug prices, an instrument of drug control policy. The elasticity of the probability of a cocaine mention with respect to own-price is estimated at -0.27, and the corresponding elasticity for the probability of a heroin mention is -0.15. The probability of any drug related episode, which captures polydrug usage, is also significantly negatively related to both cocaine and heroin prices. Cross-price effects are consistent with a complementary relationship between cocaine and heroin. Models indicate the presence of negative lagged price effects, confirming the strong addictive aspects of both drugs and the cumulative adverse effects of drug use on health.

Health Insurance and Ex Ante Moral Hazard: Evidence from Medicare

Basic economic theory suggests that health insurance coverage may cause a reduction in prevention activities, but empirical studies have yet to provide much evidence to support this prediction. However, in other insurance contexts that involve adverse health events, evidence of ex ante moral hazard is more consistent. In this paper, we extend the analysis of the effect of health insurance on health behaviors by allowing for the possibility that health insurance has a direct (ex ante moral hazard) and indirect effect on health behaviors. The indirect effect works through changes in health promotion information and the probability of illness that may be a byproduct of insurance-induced greater contact with medical professionals. We identify these two effects and in doing so identify the pure ex ante moral hazard effect. This study exploits the plausibly exogenous variation in health insurance as a result of obtaining Medicare coverage at age 65. We find evidence that obtaining health insurance reduces prevention and increases unhealthy behaviors among elderly men. We also find evidence that physician counseling is successful in changing health behaviors.

Alcohol Taxes and Labor Market Outcomes

In this paper, we present estimates of the effect of alcohol taxes on employment, hours of work per week, and wages. These are reduced form estimates derived from a structural model linking alcohol use to labor market outcomes. The reduced form estimates are meaningful in two ways: first, they provide estimates of the effect of an important public policy tool, alcohol taxes, on labor market outcomes, and second, they can be used to evaluate hypotheses about the structural effects of alcohol use on labor market outcomes. The results of the analysis suggest that alcohol taxes are unrelated to employment, hours of work, and wages. Estimates of the effect of alcohol taxes on labor market outcomes were large and imprecise, and characterized by significant variation in sign and magnitude across samples and types of alcohol taxes. This suggests that there is a weak and indeterminate relationship between alcohol taxes and labor market outcomes. This finding implies that alcohol use does not adversely affect labor market outcomes and is inconsistent with findings from previous studies.

Mental Illness and the Demand for Alcohol, Cocaine and Cigarettes

The purpose of this paper is to estimate the effect that mental illness has on the demand for addictive goods. Mental illness could affect the level of consumption of addictive goods and could affect the price elasticities of addictive goods. Demand theory suggests that mental illness would affect consumption if mental illness affected marginal utility. In addition, mental illness would affect the price elasticity if mental illness affected the rate at which marginal utility diminishes. The empirical models allow for endogeneity between mental illness and addictive consumption since prior research suggests such a relationship. The results show that individuals with a history of mental illness are 25 percent more likely to consume alcohol, 69 percent more likely to consume cocaine and 94 percent more likely to consume cigarettes. Individuals with a history of mental illness are responsive to price although the price elasticites differ somewhat from whose without mental illness. These results provide an added justification for higher taxes and other supply reduction activities since they show that these policies are effective with this high participation group. The results also suggest that an additional method of reducing the consumption of addictive goods is to subsidize the treatment of mental illness.

Risk Tolerance and Alcohol Demand Among Adults and Older Adults

This study has two primary goals. These are the examination of the effect of risk tolerance on individuals' demand for alcohol and second, the examination of the demand for alcohol by older adults over the age of 55. The data sets employed are multiple waves from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and the Health and Retirement Study (HRS). While risk tolerance can impact the level of alcohol consumption, it may also affect the sensitivity of demand to prices. There are parallels between the economist's and the psychologist's concept of risk tolerance. Research on attitudes towards risk by psychologists is part of a larger theoretical and empirical literature on personality traits. Psychologists have found risk tolerance to be an important determinant of alcohol consumption. The empirical results indicate that risk aversion has a significant negative effect on alcohol consumption, with the prevalence and consumption among risk-tolerant individuals being six to eight percent higher. Furthermore, the tax elasticity is similar across both risk-averse and risk-tolerant individuals. This suggests that tax policies may be effective in deterring alcohol consumption even among those who have a higher propensity for alcohol use. The significance of research on alcohol demand by individuals ages 55 and older is highlighted by the increased potential for alcohol-related adverse consequences among this demographic group. Comparing younger adults (ages 21-54) with older adults, responses to taxes and prices are higher among the older sub-population. The tax elasticity is estimated at -0.05 for younger adults, compared to -0.20 for older adults.

Alcohol Advertising and Alcohol Consumption by Adolescents

The purpose of this paper is to empirically estimate the effects of alcohol advertising on adolescent alcohol consumption. The theory of brand capital is used to explain the effects of advertising on consumption. The industry response function and the evidence from prior studies indicate that the empirical strategy should maximize the variance in the advertising data. The approach in this paper to maximizing the variance in advertising data is to employ cross sectional data. The Monitoring the Future (MTF) and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (NLSY97) data sets, which include only data for adolescents, are employed for the empirical work. These data sets are augmented with alcohol advertising data, originating on the market level, for five media. Use of both the MTF and the NLSY97 data sets improves the empirical analysis since each data set has its own unique advantages. The large size of the MTF makes it possible to estimate regressions with race and gender specific subsamples. The panel nature of the NLSY97 makes it possible to estimate individual fixed effects models. In addition, very similar models can be estimated with both data sets. Since the data sets are independent, the basically consistent findings increase the confidence in all the results. The results indicate that blacks participate in alcohol less than whites and their participation cannot be explained with the included variables as well as it can for whites. A comparison of male and female regressions shows that price and advertising effects are generally larger for females. Models which control for individual heterogeneity result in larger advertising effects implying that the MTF results may understate the effect of alcohol advertising. The results based on the NLSY97 suggest that a compete ban on all alcohol advertising could reduce adolescent monthly alcohol participation by about 24 percent and binge participation by about 42 percent. The past month price-participation elasticity was estimated at about -0.28 and the price-binge participation elasticity was estimated at about -0.51. Both advertising and price policies are shown to have the potential to substantially reduce adolescent alcohol consumption.

An Effective Black Hole Attack Detection Mechanism using Permutation Based Acknowledgement in MANET

With the evolution of wireless technology and use of mobile devices, Mobile Ad-hoc Network has become popular among researchers to explore. A mobile ad-hoc network (MANET) is a self-configuring network of mobile routers (and associated hosts) connected by wireless links. The routers and hosts are free to move randomly and organize themselves arbitrarily. It allows mobile nodes to communicate directly without any centralized coordinator. Such network scenarios cannot rely on centralized and organized connectivity, and can be conceived as applications of Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks. Thus, MANET is vulnerable due to its dynamic network topology, as any node become untrusted at any time. The Black hole attack is one kind of security risk in which malicious node advertises itself to have a shortest path for any destination, to forge data or for DOS attack. In this paper, to detect such nodes effectively, we propose a Permutation based Acknowledgement for most widely used reactive protocol ad-hoc on demand distance vector routing AODV. This mechanism is enhancement of Adaptive Acknowledgement (AACK) and TWO-ACK, here we have tried to show the efficiency increment by decreasing number of messages routed in the network.Comment: MANET, Black Hole, Permutation, Security, Ad-hoc networ

The Effects of Retirement on Physical and Mental Health Outcomes

While numerous studies have examined how health affects retirement behavior, few have analyzed the impact of retirement on subsequent health outcomes. This study estimates the effects of retirement on health status as measured by indicators of physical and functional limitations, illness conditions, and depression. The empirics are based on seven longitudinal waves of the Health and Retirement Study, spanning 1992 through 2005. To account for biases due to unobserved selection and endogeneity, panel data methodologies are used. These are augmented by counterfactual and specification checks to gauge the robustness and plausibility of the estimates. Results indicate that complete retirement leads to a 5-16 percent increase in difficulties associated with mobility and daily activities, a 5-6 percent increase in illness conditions, and 6-9 percent decline in mental health, over an average post-retirement period of six years. Models indicate that the effects tend to operate through lifestyle changes including declines in physical activity and social interactions. The adverse health effects are mitigated if the individual is married and has social support, continues to engage in physical activity post-retirement, or continues to work parttime upon retirement. Some evidence also suggests that the adverse effects of retirement on health may be larger in the event of involuntary retirement. With an aging population choosing to retire at earlier ages, both Social Security and Medicare face considerable shortfalls. Eliminating the embedded incentives in public and private pension plans, which discourage work beyond some point, and enacting policies that prolong the retirement age may be desirable, ceteris paribus. Retiring at a later age may lessen or postpone poor health outcomes for older adults, raise wellbeing, and reduce the utilization of health care services, particularly acute care. Working Paper 07-3

The Effects of Retirement on Physical and Mental Health Outcomes

While numerous studies have examined how health affects retirement behavior, few have analyzed the impact of retirement on subsequent health outcomes. This study estimates the effects of retirement on health status as measured by indicators of physical and functional limitations, illness conditions, and depression. The empirics are based on seven longitudinal waves of the Health and Retirement Study, spanning 1992 through 2005. To account for biases due to unobserved selection and endogeneity, panel data methodologies are used. These are augmented by counterfactual and specification checks to gauge the robustness and plausibility of the estimates. Results indicate that complete retirement leads to a 5-16 percent increase in difficulties associated with mobility and daily activities, a 5-6 percent increase in illness conditions, and 6-9 percent decline in mental health, over an average post-retirement period of six years. Models indicate that the effects tend to operate through lifestyle changes including declines in physical activity and social interactions. The adverse health effects are mitigated if the individual is married and has social support, continues to engage in physical activity post-retirement, or continues to work part-time upon retirement. Some evidence also suggests that the adverse effects of retirement on health may be larger in the event of involuntary retirement. With an aging population choosing to retire at earlier ages, both Social Security and Medicare face considerable shortfalls. Eliminating the embedded incentives in public and private pension plans, which discourage work beyond some point, and enacting policies that prolong the retirement age may be desirable, ceteris paribus. Retiring at a later age may lessen or postpone poor health outcomes for older adults, raise well-being, and reduce the utilization of health care services, particularly acute care.

Illicit Drug Use Among Arrestees and Drug Prices

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 the demand for cocaine and heroin by arrestees, employing objective indicators of use based on urinalysis. The data are repeated city cross-sections, and panel data methodologies are employed to control for policy endogeneity. Cocaine and heroin prices have a negative effect on the probability of use even among this group of heavy users. Results indicate that subjective, self-reported measures of participation are likely to be under-reported impart bias to estimates of the price elasticity. The own-price cocaine participation elasticity is about 0.17, and the own-price heroin participation elasticity is about 0.09 for arrestees. This contemporaneous elasticity understates the full effect, and the long-run price elasticity is about twice the magnitude. Estimated cross-price elasticities indicate that cocaine and heroin are economic complements. While these findings show that higher penalties, enforcement, and supply reduction activities can discourage participation by heavy users, the elasticities are smaller in magnitude relative to the estimates in the prior literature.