TY  - JOUR
AU  - Charles,Kerwin Kofi
AU  - Stephens,Melvin,Jr.
TI  - Abortion Legalization and Adolescent Substance Use
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 9193
PY  - 2002
Y2  - September 2002
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w9193
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w9193.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Kerwin Kofi Charles
Harris School of Public Policy
University of Chicago
1155 East 60th Street
Chicago, IL 60637
Tel: 773.834.8922
Fax: NA
E-Mail: kcharles@uchicago.edu
M2  - featured in NBER digest on 2003-03-01
AB  - We assess whether in utero exposure to legalized abortion in the early 1970's affected individuals' propensities to use controlled substances as adolescents. We exploit the fact that some states legalized abortion before national legalization in 1973 to compare differences in substance use for adolescents across birth cohorts in different states. We find that persons exposed to early legalization were, on average, much less likely to use controlled substances. We also assess how substance use varies with state level birth rates and abortion ratios.  Overall, our results suggest that legalization lowered substance use because of the selective use of abortion by relatively disadvantaged women.
ER  -