Abstract
In May 2018, Scotland introduced a minimum unit price on alcohol. We examine the impact of this policy on traffic fatalities and drunk driving accidents. Using administrative data on the universe of vehicle collisions in Britain and a range of quasi-experimental modeling approaches, we do not find that the policy had an effect on road crash deaths and drunk driving collisions. The results are robust to several sensitivity exercises. There is no evidence of effect heterogeneity by income and other predictors of alcohol consumption or cross-border effects. A brief discussion of the policy implications of our findings is provided.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1118-1156 |
| Number of pages | 39 |
| Journal | Journal of Policy Analysis and Management |
| Volume | 41 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| Early online date | 13 Oct 2022 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 31 Oct 2022 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:We are grateful to the Co-Editor (David Frisvold) and three anonymous referees for constructive comments and suggestions. Michèle Belot, Sonia Bhalotra, Mirco Draca, Rachel Griffith, Max Kellogg, Peter Kuhn, Giovanni Mastrobuoni, Chris Ruhm, Kjell Salvanes, Stefanie Schurer, Michel Serafinelli, and Wilbert van der Klaauw provided useful comments on previous versions of the paper. We also benefitted from discussions with participants in several seminars and conferences and with policymakers in meetings at the UK Home Office, UK Department for Transport, and Public Health Scotland who helped us to improve previous versions of the paper.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.