I am an applied microeconomist and data scientist studying health, risky behavior, and public policy. My research examines how market access and public institutions shape substance use, treatment, and health outcomes. I also serve on Oregon’s Behavioral Health Resource Network Oversight and Accountability Council.
Pour Decisions: Alcohol Privatization and Birth Outcomes
Washington’s Initiative 1183 substantially expanded spirits access through grocery and big-box stores. I study how that change affected birth outcomes and what the results imply for alcohol-tax design aimed at limiting health harms.
Abstract. Washington’s Initiative 1183 privatized spirits retail in June 2012. Using Nielsen Homescan data, restricted-use natality records, and repeated-cross-section synthetic difference-in-differences, I estimate that privatization increased projected household spirits purchases by 35 percent, reduced average birth weight, and increased low-birth-weight and small-for-gestational-age births. Distributional estimates place the response around clinically meaningful lower birth-weight bins.
