Pain Management and Work Capacity: Evidence from Marijuana Legalisation

Event Date: 3 November 2021

Speaker: Catherine Maclean is an Associate Professor at Temple University, who specialises in Health Economics, Public Policy and Labor Economics

Time: 4pm

Location: Please contact Rachel Hill (r.hill@strath.ac.uk) for Zoom details

Abstract:

"We study how the work capacity of the older working adult population responds to pain management therapy access, using the adoption of recreational marijuana laws (RMLs) as a policy shock to access. We examine Workers’ Compensation (WC) benefit receipt as a measure of work capacity, finding that WC receipt declines in response to RML adoption. We also estimate concurrent reductions in pain medication use and improvements in other metrics of work capacity, including declines in the incidence of work-limiting disabilities. The evidence suggests that the primary driver of the reductions in WC benefit receipt is an improvement in work capacity"

If you would like to read the full paper, please click here.

Published: 28 October 2021