IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wpa/wuwpmi/0111003.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Pain

Author

Listed:
  • Filip Palda

    (Ecole nationale d'administration publique in Montreal)

Abstract

Painkilling drugs produce a good called relief which reduces the fixed level of bad (pain) the individual is endowed with. These drugs have the side-effect of reducing the utility the individual gets from consuming goods. This means that the shadow price of relief counts not only the cost of drugs and their ability to reduce pain, but also the undesired reduction in pleasure from consuming goods. The tradeoff between goods and relief is non-linear and convex even for painkilling drugs that have a linear effect on pain. Small increases in pain may push the individual to a corner where painkilling drugs dominate his life. This seeming dependence on the drug has nothing to do with addiction or habit formation, but is a consequence of how consumption of these drugs changes the shadow prices of goods and relief.

Suggested Citation

  • Filip Palda, 2001. "Pain," Microeconomics 0111003, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwpmi:0111003
    Note: Type of Document - PDF; prepared on IBM PC; to print on HP/PostScript; pages: 19; figures: included. PDF document can be viewed or printed
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://econwpa.ub.uni-muenchen.de/econ-wp/mic/papers/0111/0111003.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Becker, Gary S & Tomes, Nigel, 1976. "Child Endowments and the Quantity and Quality of Children," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 84(4), pages 143-162, August.
    2. Thomas C. Buchmueller & Samuel H. Zuvekas, 1998. "Drug use, drug abuse, and labour market outcomes," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 7(3), pages 229-245, May.
    3. French, Michael T. & Zarkin, Gary A., 1995. "Is moderate alcohol use related to wages? Evidence from four worksites," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 319-344, August.
    4. Boyer, Marcel, 1983. "Rational demand and expenditures patterns under habit formation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 27-53, October.
    5. Andrew M. Gill & Robert J. Michaels, 1992. "Does Drug Use Lower Wages?," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 45(3), pages 419-434, April.
    6. Deaton,Angus & Muellbauer,John, 1980. "Economics and Consumer Behavior," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521296762.
    7. Robert Kaestner, 1994. "New Estimates of the Effect of Marijuana and Cocaine Use on Wages," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 47(3), pages 454-470, April.
    8. Suranovic, Steven M. & Goldfarb, Robert S. & Leonard, Thomas C., 1999. "An economic theory of cigarette addiction," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 1-29, January.
    9. Becker, Gary S & Murphy, Kevin M, 1988. "A Theory of Rational Addiction," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 96(4), pages 675-700, August.
    10. Zarkin, Gary A. & French, Michael T. & Mroz, Thomas & Bray, Jeremy W., 1998. "Alcohol use and wages: New results from the national household survey on drug abuse," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 53-68, January.
    11. Stigler, George J & Becker, Gary S, 1977. "De Gustibus Non Est Disputandum," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 67(2), pages 76-90, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ziggy MacDonald, 2004. "What Price Drug Use? The Contribution of Economics to an Evidence‐Based Drugs Policy," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(2), pages 113-152, April.
    2. Ziggy MacDonald & Michael Shields, "undated". "The Impact of Alcohol Use on Occupational Attainment and Wages," Discussion Papers in Public Sector Economics 98/8, Division of Economics, School of Business, University of Leicester.
    3. MacDonald, Ziggy & Pudney, Stephen, 2000. "Illicit drug use, unemployment, and occupational attainment," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(6), pages 1089-1115, November.
    4. Robert Kaestner, 1995. "The Effects of Cocaine and Marijuana Use on Marriage and Marital Stability," NBER Working Papers 5038, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Mezza, Alvaro & Buchinsky, Moshe, 2021. "Illegal drugs, education, and labor market outcomes," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 223(2), pages 454-484.
    6. Roebuck, M. Christopher & French, Michael T. & Dennis, Michael L., 2004. "Adolescent marijuana use and school attendance," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 133-141, April.
    7. Michael T. French & Gary A. Zarkin & Laura J. Dunlap, 1998. "Illicit Drug Use, Absenteeism, And Earnings At Six U.S. Worksites," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 16(3), pages 334-346, July.
    8. Zarkin, Gary A. & Mroz, Thomas A. & Bray, Jeremy W. & French, Michael T., 1998. "The relationship between drug use and labor supply for young men," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(4), pages 385-409, December.
    9. Erdal Tekin, 2004. "Employment, Wages, and Alcohol Consumption in Russia," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 71(2), pages 397-417, October.
    10. Pierre Kébreau Alexandre & Michael T. French, 2004. "Further Evidence on the Labor Market Effects of Addiction: Chronic Drug Use and Employment in Metropolitan Miami," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 22(3), pages 382-393, July.
    11. Preety Srivastava, 2010. "Does Bingeing Affect Earnings?," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 86(275), pages 578-595, December.
    12. Ziggy MacDonald & Stephen Pudney, 2000. "The Wages of Sin? Illegal Drug Use and the Labour Market," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 14(4), pages 657-673, December.
    13. Ziggy MacDonald & Stephen Pudney, 2001. "Illicit drug use and labour market achievement: evidence from the UK," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(13), pages 1655-1668.
    14. Tekin, Erdal, 2002. "Employment, Wages, and Alcohol Consumption in Russia: Evidence from Panel Data," IZA Discussion Papers 432, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    15. van Ours, J.C., 2005. "Cannabis, Cocaine and the Wages of Prime Age Males," Discussion Paper 2005-14, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    16. Chen Zhen & Michael K. Wohlgenant, 2006. "Meat Demand under Rational Habit Persistence," Canadian Journal of Agricultural Economics/Revue canadienne d'agroeconomie, Canadian Agricultural Economics Society/Societe canadienne d'agroeconomie, vol. 54(4), pages 477-495, December.
    17. Suryadipta Roy, 2007. "Are Illegal Drugs Inferior Goods in the US?," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 35(3), pages 303-314, September.
    18. Champarnaud, Luc & Michel, Philippe, 2000. "Biens culturels, transmission de culture et croissance," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 76(4), pages 501-520, décembre.
    19. Anne Bretteville-Jensen, 2006. "Drug Demand – Initiation, Continuation and Quitting," De Economist, Springer, vol. 154(4), pages 491-516, December.
    20. Williams, Jenny & van Ours, Jan C., 2017. "Early Cannabis Use and School to Work Transition of Young Men," IZA Discussion Papers 10488, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Pain; addiction; drugs; household production;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I10 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - General
    • D13 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Production and Intrahouse Allocation

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwpmi:0111003. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: EconWPA (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://econwpa.ub.uni-muenchen.de .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.