On behalf of the Comparative Advantage Editorial Board, we are pleased to present the ninth volume, summer issue, of Stanford University's undergraduate economics journal. This volume presents undergraduate work on a wide variety of topics, including environmental economics, political economy, and labor economics. Furthermore, as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to exact a toll on individuals… Continue reading Our Summer 2021 Issue
Category: Health Economics
An Update on the Substitution between Alcohol and Marijuana: Evidence from the Legal Drinking Age and Medical Marijuana Laws
Stephen Kisty, University of Pittsburgh -- This paper attempts to update the analysis that utilizes a regression discontinuity design to examine the effect of increased availability of legal alcohol at age 21, caused by the minimum legal drinking age in the United States, on the consumption of marijuana (Crost and Guerrero, 2012).
The Efficacy of State-Level PrEP Access Programs: A Tale of Two States
By Noah Zwiefel, Macalester College -- Pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) reinvents what we know about HIV prevention by nearly eliminating the risk that an individual will seroconvert after exposure to HIV. Uptake, however, has been slow in many areas where it would be most beneficial.
Regional Approaches to Combating the United States’ Opioid Epidemic
By Spencer Papay, Columbia University -- This paper investigates the relationship between federally-funded community health centers and opioid overdoses across America’s distinct geographic regions.
The ACA Medicaid Expansion’s Impact on Bankruptcy
By Noah Zwiefel, Macalester College
--
This paper explores the relationship between the ACA Medicaid Expansion and the bankruptcy rate in states that did and did not expand their Medicaid programs. In general, past research has found that ...