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What Drives Risky Prescription Opioid Use? Evidence from Migration

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Finkelstein, Amy, Gentzkow, Matthew, Li, Dean, Williams, Heidi·2022·National Bureau of Economic Research

Abstract

We investigate the role of person-and place-specific factors in the opioid epidemic by developing and estimating a dynamic model of risky prescription opioid use.We estimate the model using the relationship between cross-state migration and risky use among adults receiving federal disability insurance from 2006 to 2015.Event studies suggest that moving to a state with a 3.5 percentage point higher rate of risky use (roughly the difference between the 20th and 80th percentile states) increases the probability of risky use by 1.0 percentage point on-impact, followed by an additional increase of 0.30 percentage points per subsequent year.Model estimates imply large place effects in both the likelihood of transitioning to addiction and the availability of prescription opioids.A one standard deviation reduction in all place effects would have reduced risky use by two-thirds over our study period.Reductions in place effects on addiction have a larger cumulative effect than analogous reductions in place effects on availability.However, their relative efficacy is reversed in the first few years, suggesting a temporal tradeoff among policy options.

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  • They can also be used to estimate statistical moments, which in turn can be used to estimate a structural model, as in Finkelstein et al. (2022).

    “They can also be used to estimate statistical moments, which in turn can be used to estimate a structural model, as inFinkelstein et al. (2022).”

    From An Introductory Guide to Event Study Models (2023) · cites this paper as Finkelstein et al. (2022)

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Authors
Finkelstein, A., Gentzkow, M., Li, D., & Williams, H.
Affiliations
National Bureau of Economic Research (US)
Venue
National Bureau of Economic Research
Published
2022-09
OpenAlex
W4297852879
Cited by
20
References
6
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 3 · 2020: 1 · 2019: 1
Type
report
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • National Bureau of Economic Research (publishedVersion)
  • RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • National Science Foundation (1151497, RDR18000003)
  • U.S. Social Security Administration (RDR18000003)
  • Australian Government
  • Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research
  • National Institute on Aging
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Opioid Use Disorder Treatment
  • Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Healthcare Policy and Management
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Epidemiology › Substance Abuse Treatment and Outcomes
Keywords
prescription opioid use, opioid epidemic, opioid use disorder, place effects, opioid availability, opioid prescribing

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