The Gorbachev Anti-Alcohol Campaign and Russia's Mortality Crisis
Top Cited Papers
- 1 January 2013
- journal article
- Published by American Economic Association in American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
- Vol. 5 (2), 232-260
- https://doi.org/10.1257/app.5.2.232
Abstract
Political and economic transition is often blamed for Russia's 40 percent surge in deaths between 1990 and 1994. Highlighting that increases in mortality occurred primarily among alcohol-related causes and among working-age men (the heaviest drinkers), this paper investigates an alternative explanation: the demise of the 1985–1988 Gorbachev Anti-Alcohol Campaign. Using archival sources to build a new oblast-year dataset spanning 1978–2000, we find a variety of evidence suggesting that the campaign's end explains a large share of the mortality crisis, implying that Russia's transition to capitalism and democracy was not as lethal as commonly suggested. (JEL D72, I12, I18, P26, P36)Keywords
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