%0 Report
        %A Guthridge, Steve
%A Schurer, Stefanie
%A Taylor, Paige J.
        %T Minimum Unit Pricing, Alcohol Consumption and Infant Health: Evidence from the Alice Springs Liquor Supply Plan
        %D 2025
        %8 2025 Oct
        %I Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        %C Bonn
        %7 IZA Discussion Paper
        %N 18201
        %U https://www.iza.org/publications/dp18201
        %X Restricting purchases or establishing a minimum (floor) price for low-cost, high-strength alcoholic beverages is an increasingly popular policy used to address problem drinking and alcohol-related harm. We study the consumption and short-term health-at-birth impacts of the 2006 Alice Springs Liquor Supply Plan (LSP) which effectively doubled the minimum per-unit price of alcohol by prohibiting sales of large containers of wine. Net alcohol consumption per person dropped by 12%. Both price and consumption remained unaffected in control regions. We estimated a price elasticity of demand for the cheapest drink in the market as low as -0.2. While this change decreased the total volume of pure alcohol consumed, it did not achieve a key policy objective to improve infant health outcomes among babies most at-risk for alcohol-related harm. We discuss mechanisms and potential policy conclusions.
        %K birth outcomes
%K health behaviours
%K alcohol regulation
%K difference-in-difference estimation