Venue: The Fuqua School of Business, Duke University, 1 Towerview Drive, Durham, NC 27708-0120

 

Presentation

The Drinking Age, Alcohol Consumption, and Crime

Authors:

Presenter: Christopher Carpenter (University of California, Irvine)

Discussant: Andreea Balan Cohen (Tufts University)

Session: Public Policies, Quasi-Experiments, and Health

Room: Classroom E

When: Monday 1 p.m. - 2:30 p.m.

We use the exogenous variation in alcohol consumption induced by Minimum Legal Drinking Age (MLDA) laws and data from California to determine how much an increase in drinking increases criminal behavior. We find that individuals just over age 21 are 32 percent more likely to report having consumed alcohol in the previous month and drink on 70 percent more days than those just under age 21. This greater alcohol consumption results in a 6 percent increase in arrests, which is largely attributable to robberies, assaults, DUI, drunkenness, and disorderly conduct. These results imply an elasticity of about .08, which suggests that crime will increase significantly if proposals to reduce the legal drinking age are passed.