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Does the Minimum Legal Drinking Age Save Lives?

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Author Info
Jeffrey A. Miron
Elina Tetelbaum

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Abstract

The minimum legal drinking age (MLDA) is widely believed to save lives by reducing traffic fatalities among underage drivers. Further, the Federal Uniform Drinking Age Act, which pressured all states to adopt an MLDA of 21, is regarded as having contributed enormously to this life saving effect. This paper challenges both claims. State-level panel data for the past 30 years show that any nationwide impact of the MLDA is driven by states that increased their MLDA prior to any inducement from the federal government. Even in early adopting states, the impact of the MLDA did not persist much past the year of adoption. The MLDA appears to have only a minor impact on teen drinking.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 13257.

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Date of creation: Jul 2007
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13257

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
H11 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - Structure and Scope of Government
K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law

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Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Dee, Thomas S., 1999. "State alcohol policies, teen drinking and traffic fatalities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(2), pages 289-315, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Christopher Carpenter & Deborah Kloska & Patrick O'Malley & Lloyd Johnston, 2007. "Alcohol Control Policies and Youth Alcohol Consumption: Evidence from 28 Years of Monitoring the Future," Topics in Economic Analysis & Policy, Berkeley Electronic Press, vol. 7(1), pages 1637-1637. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Ruhm, Christopher J., 1996. "Alcohol policies and highway vehicle fatalities," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 435-454, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Kaestner, Robert, 2000. "A Note on the Effect of Minimum Drinking Age Laws on Youth Alcohol Consumption," Contemporary Economic Policy, Oxford University Press, vol. 18(3), pages 315-25, July.
  5. Timothy Besley & Anne Case, 1994. "Unnatural Experiments? Estimating the Incidence of Endogenous Policies," NBER Working Papers 4956, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  1. Beth A. Freeborn & Brian McManus, 2007. "Substance Abuse Treatment and Motor Vehicle Fatalities," Working Papers 66, Department of Economics, College of William and Mary. [Downloadable!]
  2. Tara Watson & Angela Fertig, 2008. "Minimum Drinking Age Laws and Infant Health Outcomes," NBER Working Papers 14118, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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