Can Labor Market Policies Reduce Deaths of Despair? |
| |
| Institution: | 1. VA Office of Mental Health and Suicide Prevention, Veterans Health Administration, Washington, DC 20420, United States;2. VA Serious Mental Illness Treatment Resource and Evaluation Center, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, United States;3. VA Center of Excellence for Suicide Prevention, Canandaigua, NY, 14424, United States;4. VA Northeast Program Evaluation Center, West Haven, CT, 06516, United States;5. Department of Psychiatry, Yale University, New Haven, CT, 06520, United States;6. Department of Psychiatry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, 48109, United States |
| |
| Abstract: | Do minimum wages and the earned income tax credit (EITC) mitigate rising “deaths of despair?” We leverage state variation in these policies over time to estimate event study and difference-in-differences models of deaths due to drug overdose, suicide, and alcohol-related causes. Our causal models find no significant effects on drug or alcohol-related mortality, but do find significant reductions in non-drug suicides. A 10 percent minimum wage increase reduces non-drug suicides among low-educated adults by 2.7 percent, and the comparable EITC figure is 3.0 percent. Placebo tests and event-study models support our causal research design. Increasing both policies by 10 percent would likely prevent a combined total of more than 700 suicides each year. |
| |
| Keywords: | Mortality Deaths of despair Suicide Minimum wage Earned income tax credit |
| 本文献已被 ScienceDirect 等数据库收录！ |
|
