Sex Education: Just Say No or Safety Dance

I liked a recent blog post by Megan Mcardle on sex education. She points to research that shows that DARE, the anti-drug program that encourages kids "to just say no", has been shown to have no impact on drug use. This result is one of my father’s favorite, because it demonstrates that showing something has no impact is often as important as showing something has an impact.


Mcardle then questions if drug education doesn’t work, then perhaps sex education does not either. But she does not cite any studies. I looked around, this article in the Journal of Health Economics suggests that Aids education in the US increases contraceptive use, but does not hasten or increase sexual activity.


I’m not able to read it, but this meta-study of 83 studies finds that some (not all) Aids education programs reduce sexual risky behavior and do not increase activity. So based on a brief literature review (i.e. Google Scholar/Econlin check),



I don’t think we can say that sex education does not work like DARE.



I think we can all agree though the best alternative is not to tax sex as Steven Dubner proposes over at Freakonomics.

What Is it Like Living on $1 a Day?

I was rereading an article this morning by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, which describes the lives of people consuming less than $1 a day. The $1 a day measure was originally created because it approximated what it would cost to feed a person.

The paper uses household surveys from 13 countries to get an overview of what the poor spend their money on. Not surprisingly, food is the highest expenditure with anywhere from 50-75% of the budget. Spending on alcohol and tobacco is not uncommon. But, in many countries these families also spend 10% of their budget on festivals, weddings and funerals.

Even if the poor had more money the article cites studies that have shown that not all of the additional money would be spent on food. Some would be spent on “entertainment.” I like how the study puts it into perspective in these lines:

“In other words, many poor people save money that they could have eaten today in order to spend more on entertainment in the future, which does not immediately fit the idea of their lacking self-control.

“The need to spend more on entertainment rather than on food appears to be a strongly felt need, not something that would go away if the poor could plan better.”

Cash For School Performance in DC

I’m back in DC after spending the summer in California. To get ready for my return to DC/Baltimore I have been watching the fifth season of the Wire, I still have a few disks to go so don’t ruin the ending for me.

In the fifth season Baltimore mayor Tony Carcetti spends a lot of time worrying about Baltimore City schools test scores. One tool he never tried was paying students to do better on tests. This type of program has become popular recently in Latin America paying households cash on the condition that they attend school. On my recent trip to rural Oaxaca most families received government funds and now almost all children completely through 8th grade.

In the US the problems are slightly different. You can get the kids to go to school, but improving tests scores is harder. Last March I discussed how New York City is trying a program that pays students if they keep regular attendance, turn in homework, and pass state tests.

Now that program is coming to DC. Along with a randomized trial (students in 14 schools will receive money and will be compared with 14 similar schools in a control group that won’t) Also like NYC Ronald Fryer, Harvard Economist, will be doing the analysis.

I look forward to seeing the results.

Short and Long Run Responses to Price Changes

Last fall, South Dakota businessman Steve Polley was scouting for ways to make some extra income when he saw a news headline: The price of hops was surging because of a global shortage.

From a recent Wall Street journal article on hops (the stuff that makes beer bitter and tasty).

When the price of an agricultural good goes up and there are profits to be made by selling it, people like Steve Polley, will try to start producing more. However, if you plant hops it takes several years to produce any. So if the demand for hops goes up because people like to drink beers like 60 minute IPA or Hops Slam, the price of hops in the short run is likely to surge up.
But after a few years all those farmers who planted additional hops start seeing yields. The price of hops will start to fall back after a few years (the long run). Or as the article put it

Some hops experts are skeptical about the prospects of the new growers. Ralph Olson, owner of Hopunion CBS LLC, a broker of hops, predicts many nascent growers won't be in business in a few years. Prices will come down, and insects can wreak havoc, he warns. Hops "are tough," he says. "The economics aren't there."

Same story can be told about coffee or oil. It takes a few years to adjust to a change in prices.

Shameless Self Promotion: Work on Minor League Baseball

My Towson colleague, Tom Rhoads, and I recently wrote a paper on minor league baseball attendance. Looking at the impact of winning, homeruns, and major league prices.

Along with some great data from baseball-reference.com we also used information on the cost of going to a major league game from Team Marking Report. You might be familiar with their average cost of a family of 4 going to a major league baseball game each year.

Jon Greenberg, from Team Marketing Report, wrote up a nice profile of our work.

What are Economists Good For?

When I tell people I’m an economics professor, I usually get one of two reactions.

1.The econ class I took in college was really boring, hard, or yuck! (Occasionally it is positive)
2.What do you think is going to happen with the stock market, price of oil, or housing prices?

Scott Adams, the man behind Dilbert, offers up his view of what economists are good for.
“…if an economist tries to tell you where the stock market will be in a year, you can safely ignore that. But if he tells you a gas tax holiday is an unambiguously bad idea, that's worth listening to, especially if economists on both sides of the aisle agree.”

So ironically, we are asked most about what we cannot give a good answered for, but ignored when we can give a good one.

At least I don’t have to hear the same lawyer joke over and over again.

Also, I wonder what people ask proctologists.

h/t to Newmark’s door

One Child Policy, Sex Ratio and Crime in China

Over on Voxeu.org, Esther Duflo has a very readable piece on the potential rise in crime caused by gender selection as a result of China’s one child policy. As Duflo points out there are nearly 110 young males (age 15-25) for every 100 young women. As the only child generation has reached adulthood, crime rates have increased over 13%.

Duflo cites a recent study by Chinese and American researchers: “Sex ratio and crime: Evidence from China’s one-Child Policy” (by Edlund, Li, Yi, and Zhang). The study compares regions that had different rates of enforcement of the one-child policy, which led to differences in the male to female sex ratio. Overall, Duflo says that the increase explains about 1/7 (2% ish) of the increase.

I went to look at the paper and the abstract posted (here) says that crime had increased 5-6% from the change in sex ratio. Even though the downloadable working paper (here) is more in line with the 2-3% number Duflo cites?

A couple of questions arise though. What is the impact of 3-6% rise in the crime rate? Could this impact China’s economic growth prospects, particularly since the ratio is now 120 boys to 100 girls?

My solution to the problem. Bring more Chinese males to American Universities (see here). (OK that won't work either).

How about paying households who have girls in China?

h/t to Chris Blattman