Working Paper: NBER ID: w23192
Authors: Alex Hollingsworth; Christopher J. Ruhm; Kosali Simon
Abstract: We examine how deaths and emergency department (ED) visits related to use of opioid analgesics (opioids) and other drugs vary with macroeconomic conditions. As the county unemployment rate increases by one percentage point, the opioid death rate per 100,000 rises by 0.19 (3.6%) and the opioid overdose ED visit rate per 100,000 increases by 0.95 (7.0%). Macroeconomic shocks also increase the overall drug death rate, but this increase is driven by rising opioid deaths. Our findings hold when performing a state-level analysis, rather than county-level; are primarily driven by adverse events among whites; and are stable across time periods.
Keywords: opioid abuse; macroeconomic conditions; drug deaths; emergency department visits
JEL Codes: I1; I12; I15
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| County unemployment rate (J64) | Opioid-related deaths (I12) |
| County unemployment rate (J64) | Opioid overdose ED visits (I19) |
| County unemployment rate (J64) | Overall drug death rate (I12) |
| Opioid-related deaths (I12) | Overall drug death rate (I12) |
| County unemployment rate (J64) | Opioid-related deaths (whites) (I12) |
| County unemployment rate (J64) | Opioid-related deaths (blacks) (I12) |
| County unemployment rate (J64) | Opioid-related deaths (Hispanics) (I12) |