Measuring the human cost of a weak economy: Does unemployment lead to alcohol abuse?

doi:10.1016/S0277-9536(96)00160-8

Social Science & Medicine

Volume 44, Issue 2, January 1997, Pages 251-260

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0277-9536(96)00160-8 Get rights and content

Abstract

This paper uses two-stage instrumental variables methods to examine whether unemployment affects alcohol use and symptoms of dependence, and if so, in which direction. Data were obtained from the 1988 National Health Interview Survey. The outcomes examined were average daily consumption during the previous two weeks and a summary measure of the number of symptoms related to alcohol dependence during the previous year. After eliminating potential bias due to reverse causality, evidence was found that non-employment significantly reduces both alcohol consumption and dependence symptoms, probably due to an income effect. Involuntary unemployment had a mixed effect—job loss increased the consumption of alcohol in the overall sample but reduced dependence symptoms among single respondents. Studies of the impact of alcohol use on economic outcomes should take potential reverse causality into account.

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Measuring the human cost of a weak economy: Does unemployment lead to alcohol abuse?

Abstract

The de facto U.S. mental and addictive disorders service system

Archives of General Psychiatry

Employment, earnings, and psychiatric diagnosis

Economic Costs of Alcohol and Drug Abuse and Mental Illness

The effect of alcohol use on wages

Applied Economics

The economic costs of alcohol abuse: an assessment of current methods and estimates

Journal of Studies on Alcohol

Life-cycle effects of alcoholism on education, earnings, and occupation

Inquiry

The Economic Costs of Alcohol and Drug Abuse and Mental Illness, 1985

Gender differences in labor market effects of alcoholism

Alcohol use and wages of young men: whites vs. nonwhites

International Review of Applied Economics

Alcoholism, work, and income

Journal of Labor Economics