Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/242584 
Year of Publication: 
2020
Series/Report no.: 
Economics Working Paper Series No. 2020/12
Publisher: 
Auckland University of Technology (AUT), Faculty of Business, Economics and Law, Auckland
Abstract: 
The minimum alcohol purchasing age in New Zealand was lowered from 20 to 18 in December 1999. Focusing on two distinct legislative regimes, we utilize a national-level census of criminal convictions to examine the impact of unrestricted alcohol purchasing rights on alcohol-related crime. Our study reveals that overall trends in alcohol-related crimes are obscured by offences that can only be prosecuted up to a certain age. After removing confounding influences from additional regulations that hold relevance under one legislative regime but not the other, we do not find a statistically meaningful increase in overall measures of alcohol-related crimes at the minimum legal alcohol purchasing age. Our analysis suggests that compared to more commonly analyzed minimum legal drinking age legislation, governmental regulations that allow limited exposure to moderated drinking experiences prior to permitting alcohol purchasing rights might be more effective in mitigating alcohol-induced risky behaviors.
Subjects: 
minimum legal purchasing age
alcohol-related crime
court charges
youth behavior
regression discontinuity
JEL: 
C21
I12
I18
K14
K42
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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