An interesting beer econometric research

An interesting econometric research focuses on levels of addiction based on three different situations – parents supply alcohol, living in a single-parent household, and having received education about alcohol, narcotics and tobacco. Alcohol was divided into three categories – beer, wine and spirits. Eight hundred and thirty three individuals were surveyed and participants were aged between 12-18 years. Concepts used were negative binomial regression, censored regression and probit regression ( I don’t know the first two kinds, have used the probit a few times).

Having parents offer kids alcohol increased frequency of beer consumption and also increased probability of binge drinking and participation in drinking. This is because those individuals have easy availability of alcohol and also reduces their psychological costs of consumption.

The interesting thing about the research was a negative correlation between education in narcotics, alcohol and beer consumption. I suspect that people who are more educated on drugs choose to limit themselves to beer drinking.

The paper is written by Dr. Petter Lundborg, a professor for health economics in Lund university in Sweden.