Original Article
Marijuana and alcohol: Evidence using border analysis and retail sales data
Michele Baggio,
Alberto Chong,
Sungoh Kwon,
Corresponding Author
Michele Baggio
University of Connecticut
Corresponding author: Michele Baggio, michele.baggio@uconn.eduSearch for more papers by this authorAlberto Chong
Georgia State University and Universidad del Pacifico
Search for more papers by this authorMichele Baggio,
Alberto Chong,
Sungoh Kwon,
Corresponding Author
Michele Baggio
University of Connecticut
Corresponding author: Michele Baggio, michele.baggio@uconn.eduSearch for more papers by this authorAlberto Chong
Georgia State University and Universidad del Pacifico
Search for more papers by this authorAbstract
enWe use retail scanner data on purchases of alcoholic beverages across US counties for 2006 to 2015 to study the link between medical marijuana laws (MMLs) and alcohol consumption. To do this, we exploit differences in the timing of marijuana laws among states and find that they are substitutes. We show that unlike traditional national-level analysis, focusing on contiguous-border county pairs provides unbiased estimates of the effect of MMLs on alcohol sales. Specifically, alcohol sales in counties located in MML states decreased by 12.4%. Results are robust to including placebo effective dates for MMLs in treated states.
Résumé
frMarijuana et alcool: analyse transfrontalière et données relatives à la vente au détail. Afin d’étudier la corrélation entre les lois sur la marijuana médicale (LMM) et la consommation d’alcool, nous nous sommes appuyés sur les données de vente au détail de boissons alcoolisées dans différents comtés des États-Unis entre 2005 et 2016. À cette fin, nous avons d’abord exploité le décalage dans le temps des mises en œ uvre des LMM dans les états concernés, et avons découvert qu’alcool et marijuana se substituaient l’un à l’autre. Nous montrons également qu’une analyse réalisée sur des paires de comtés transfrontaliers, contrairement à une étude traditionnelle réalisée à l’échelle nationale, permettait de fournir des évaluations fiables relativement à l’incidence des LMM sur les ventes d’alcool. Plus précisément, le volume mensuel des ventes d’alcool dans les comtés situés dans des états ayant passé des lois sur la marijuana médicale a diminué de 12,4 %. Les résultats restent robustes même en intégrant de fausses dates de mise en œ uvre des LLM dans les états étudiés.
Supporting Information
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