At least that is the the public health take-away of a recent study analyzing the public health impacts of an increase in the alcohol tax in Maryland.
The Baltimore Sun:
Maryland recorded 7,400 cases of the bacterial infection in 2010, when alcohol, like other goods, was taxed at 6 percent. But two years later, with a 9 percent levy tacked on to booze sales, gonorrhea cases in the state dropped below 5,700, even as infection rates grew nationally.
Researchers at the University of Florida say they can only find one explanation: the alcohol tax.
“We know increasing alcohol taxes decreases alcohol consumption,” said Stephanie Staras, the lead author of the study, published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. “We also know that people who are using alcohol are more likely to have risky sexual behavior.”
Besides being a great opportunity to for an excellent post title, this is a good illustration of how insurance design is important but far less important to general health than general socio-enviromental factors. Maryland was looking to raise revenue and perhaps decrease drunk driving when they increased the tax. Tertiary impacts on sexually transmitted infection (STI) rates were most likely not part of the political debate.
However, if these results hold up, and logically they make sense as alcohol consumption leads to bad decision making, avoiding seventeen hundred STI cases avoids significant treatment cost and more importantly, it avoids significant pain and risk for individuals. Avoidance through changing the environmental and economic matrix is far more efficient treatment than post-infection treatment.
Tom Levenson
Sounds like a movie title proposed in the 19th hour of the brainstorming session…
CrustyDem
So the claim is that a 3% increase in liquor tax caused a 23% reduction in gonorrhea? Correlation really is causation!!
Jager
After a quick review of my personal history, I concur with the researcher’s conclusions. I’ve done some really stupid shit under the influence of alcohol, no STDs. But a huge, powerful set of beer goggles would appear from time to time, made by Steiner, so I blame Hitler.
Mike J
@CrustyDem:
If you believe in cause and effect, it’s usually the best place to start looking.
NotMax
How vewwy, vewwy Puritan.
Gee, maybe a bunch of people found decent jobs over those 2 years and had the extra money to spend on prophylactics or less time on their hands?
Omnes Omnibus
Best safety briefing I ever heard before soldiers got a weekend pass in the army was “Don’t drink and drive. And, remember: no glove, no love.”
NotMax
@Omnes Omnibus
Gasoline and alcohol don’t mix. Drink one or the other.
:)
CrustyDem
@Mike J:
Couldn’t agree more, but the idea that a tiny increase in liquor tax caused a huge reduction in gonorrhea (and not chlamydia) is just embarrassing..
Mike J
@CrustyDem: It would depend on what happened to the drinking rate. If raising the alcohol tax could decrease the DUI rate as it was intended to, why not the FUI rate?
Doug R
Clap for the new Tax!
Petorado
The Dead Kennedys have a rebuttal.
Adam L Silverman
@CrustyDem: That’s a lot of banging for the buck!
Omnes Omnibus
@Petorado: Pure win. I go listen now.
ETA: Listened, I have.
Oatler.
“Fucking”? First I thought this was a pissed-off Cole post.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Oatler.:
I think it would be any Cole post.
Petorado
@Omnes Omnibus: It was a random moment of free association.
: )
Omnes Omnibus
@Petorado: It worked for me. For whatever satisfaction that gives.
Punchy
Sorry, but that’s some piss-poor “science”. To attempt to connect the two based on some theory that EtOH is positively correlated to STDs without examining more variables is ridiculous. Do lower taxed states have higher rates? Does lowering the rate increase the infection rate? Can it be that as of a few years ago, everyone needs health care coverage, so perhaps doctors are simply diagnosing cases that in the past went undiagnosed/untreated? Does the use of other drugs follow the same positive correlation? Do other STDs see a similar correlation? Not seeing answers to any of these.
Sloppy work.
? Martin
How the fuck did Temple of Doom even get 3 stars? That moment when cursed Indy smirks as the woman is being lowered into the lava – we were all on the same page there.
I am so tired of being sick.
trollhattan
I’m leaving this here for y’all to ponder. Words. I have none.
Okay, one thought: I believe I have Ted Cruz’ ideal running mate.
Mike J
@Petorado: I loved the DKs when I was 17. A few years later when I realised the first version of California Über Alles was about Jerry Brown I had to learn to enjoy them without paying attention to the lyrics.
It’s not as if Reagan hadn’t already been governor in California. Calling Jerry Brown a nazi just seemed moronic to me after I had gotten past the age for freshman comp.
Mike J
@trollhattan: Did you see the clause in the contract that indemnified WTC for one heist attempt to steal back the album?
Face
Show me a dude-bro who’ll decide to not buy a six pack or case to bring to a house party full of hotties simply because of a 3% higher tax. Show me a guy who’ll refuse to buy that bottle of beer standing next to a chick he’d like to drill because it costs an extra $0.13. Show me just one. Unpossible.
Correlation does not mean cau….you know the rest.
Omnes Omnibus
@Face: Dude might step down the quality of beer being purchased. That’s it.
Mike J
@Face: Every time they’ve raised taxes on cigarettes, the results have been lower rates of smoking among the most price sensitive customers, usually meaning teens. I don’t see why it wouldn’t be the same with alcohol.
Face
@Mike J: I think it’s cuz, in my experience, when they raise the taxes on tobaccy, it’s always something absurd, like $1 a pack. And smokers need 1-2 packs a day. Also, teens aren’t buying alcohol, at least not legally or easily.
Doug R
@? Martin: TOD was the weakest Indy movie ’til that horrid lazy Crystal Skull.
? Martin
@Mike J: But you always have a dilutive effect for any reasonably elastic commodity. That is, if you increase the price by x% you’ll always get a <x% effect. Now, that may not evenly distribute because some parts of the market are more sensitive to price than others, but getting 20% effect from a 3% cause is pretty much bullshit – especially since it's not directly causal. How many committed married couples are alcohol buyers (a lot)? Even if their sex frequency changes due to the change in alcohol consumption, the odds of getting an STD don't change at all.
Doug R
@Face: Maybe one less brewski, which could make all the difference.
? Martin
@Doug R: Crystal Skull was less annoying and at least better made (technicals).
Ruckus
Less Stupid Fucking in Maryland.
Probably not a lot less fucking stupid though.
Duane
@trollhattan:
MattF
Post’s title is reminiscent of Dorothy Parker.
BretH
Sounds good. There’s just one rather crucial data point missing in the article (hopefully not in the study): did alcohol consumption really drop? We’re told it should, when taxes are raised, but we have no earthly way of knowing if it did.
FWIW I love reading the Daily Howler blog, which presents cases like this where journalists get lazy.