The War on Drugs: Methamphetamine, Public Health, and Crime

Dobkin, Carlos; Nicosia, Nancy

doi:10.1257/aer.99.1.324

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American Economic Review: Vol. 99 No. 1 (March 2009)

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The War on Drugs: Methamphetamine, Public Health, and Crime

Article Citation

Dobkin, Carlos, and Nancy Nicosia. 2009. "The War on Drugs: Methamphetamine, Public Health, and Crime." American Economic Review, 99(1): 324-49.

DOI: 10.1257/aer.99.1.324

Abstract

In mid-1995, a government effort to reduce the supply of methamphetamine precursors successfully disrupted the methamphetamine market and interrupted a trajectory of increasing usage. The price of methamphetamine tripled and purity declined from 90 percent to 20 percent. Simultaneously, amphetaminerelated hospital and treatment admissions dropped 50 percent and 35 percent, respectively. Methamphetamine use among arrestees declined 55 percent. Although felony methamphetamine arrests fell 50 percent, there is no evidence of substantial reductions in property or violent crime. The impact was largely temporary. The price returned to its original level within four months; purity, hospital admissions, treatment admissions, and arrests approached preintervention levels within eighteen months. (JEL I12, K42)

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Authors

Dobkin, Carlos (U CA, Santa Cruz)
Nicosia, Nancy (RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, CA)

JEL Classifications

I12: Health Production
K42: Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law