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Title: Three Essays on the Effect of Incarceration, Drug Use and Abortion Legalization on STD Risk

Citation Type: Dissertation/Thesis

Publication Year: 2007

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Abstract: In this dissertation, I argue that the "war on drugs" has increased Black STD risk by creating imbalanced sex ratios which has enabled men with "tastes" for promiscuity to form risky sexual relationships. I test this hypothesis in several ways. First, I use data from the NLSY97 to examine the effect of mating options on promiscuity and condom use and use diverging sex ratios for Blacks in late adolescence to identify the effect of mating options on risky sexual behavior. I find that Black men at the 90th quantile-men I term "promiscuous"-will have between 1.3 and 2.4 more female sex partners a year due to changes in the sex ratio over the sample period. I also find evidence that Black men alter their condom use in response to the sex ratio. Separately, I test for a link between incarceration rates and STD outcomes. I find strong evidence that Black incarceration rates are associated with higher rates of gonorrhea and syphilis among Black females. I also have provided the first quantitative evidence that the crack epidemic increased gonorrhea and syphilis. Gonorrhea rates began falling in the mid-to-late 1980s as the prison population continued expanding. I argue that abortion legalization, waning crack and the AIDS epidemic are partly responsible for these changes. I exploit the natural experiment offered by early legalization of abortion five states in 1970, compared to universal legalization in 1973, to estimate the

Url: https://getd.libs.uga.edu/pdfs/cunningham_anthony_s_200708_phd.pdf

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Authors: Cunningham, Anthony Scott

Institution: University of Tennessee-Knoxville

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Pages: 120

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Health

Countries: United States