Tuesday, December 2, 2008

99 Bottles Of Beer On The Wall

I have an account with the Social Science Research Network where I find lots of interesting papers to peruse. While browsing at random, I came across this title.

"Estimating the Impact of Beer Prices on the Incidence of Sexually Transmitted Diseases: Cross-Province and Time Series Evidence from Canada"

Abstract: We attempt to contribute to the literature by evaluating the effects of higher beer prices on gonorrhea and chlamydia rates through pooling data across Canadian provinces and over time. Ordinary least squares as well as instrumental variables estimates suggest that higher real beer prices are correlated with a reduction in both gonorrhea and chlamydia rates, with corresponding implied elasticities within a tightly defined interval of (roughly) 0.7 to 0.9. However, the increase in real beer prices over the sample period is only responsible for less than a tenth of the decline in gonorrhea rates.

For the life of me, I can't imagine anyone outside of a writer for The Daily Show asking the question, "What effect does the price of beer have on the rate of sexually transmitted diseases...ummmm...in Canada?"

No comments: