Recessions and Admissions to Substance Abuse Treatment

Previous economic research shows that recessions lead to worsening substance abuse. In this paper we study the effect of recessions on admissions to specialty substance abuse treatment using administrative data between 1992 and 2015. Using data from Treatment Episode Data Set and a differences-in-differences empirical strategy, we find no evidence that recessions influence the overall number of admissions. However, we document substantial heterogeneity across drugs of abuse. Combining our findings with previous economic studies suggests that unmet need for substance abuse treatment increases during recessions.