Abstract
The violence associated with crack cocaine markets in the 1980s and 1990s has repercussions today. Using cross-city variation in when crack cocaine arrived and an older comparison group, we estimate that the US murder rate of black males aged 15–24 was still 70 percent higher 17 years after crack markets had emerged. Using the fraction of gun-related suicides as a proxy for gun availability, we find that increased access to guns led to persistently higher murder rates. Our estimates imply that more guns due to crack-related violence explains approximately one-tenth of the current life-expectancy gap between white and black males.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Article number | 104581 |
| Journal | Journal of Public Economics |
| Volume | 206 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Feb 2022 |
Funding
The authors thank Michael Smith and Timothy Seida for excellent research assistance, Chris Poliquin for sharing data on gun policies, and seminar participants at Auburn University, Harvard University, Northwestern University, University of Georgia, University of Nebraska, Vanderbilt University, and University of Notre Dame for a number of helpful suggestions. Moore acknowledges financial support from the Australian Research Council (Discovery Early Career Research Award DE170100608). The authors thank Michael Smith and Timothy Seida for excellent research assistance, Chris Poliquin for sharing data on gun policies, and seminar participants at Auburn University, Harvard University, Northwestern University, University of Georgia, University of Nebraska, Vanderbilt University, and University of Notre Dame for a number of helpful suggestions. Moore acknowledges financial support from the Australian Research Council (Discovery Early Career Research Award DE170100608).
Keywords
- Black males
- Crack cocaine
- Drug epidemics
- Guns
- Homicide
- Life expectancy
- Murder
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Finance
- Economics and Econometrics
