Higher education: The impact of recreational marijuana on college applications

Using a two-way fixed effects difference-in-differences model, we investigate the effects of local recreational marijuana (RMJ) policy changes on college applications and find that the three largest state public schools reaped, on average, an almost 54% increase in applications. This increase does not appear to come solely from low-ability students as both first and third quartiles of admitted student composite SAT scores to the largest three public schools do not decrease. Rather, they both increase by almost 3.8% though these estimates are not statistically significant. Robust difference-in-difference and event study models support the signs and magnitudes of these gains and show they diminish over time.

Automated summary

This study investigates the effects of local recreational marijuana policy changes on college applications using a two-way fixed effects difference-in-differences model. The results show that the three largest state public schools experienced an average increase of almost 54% in applications. It is interesting to note that this increase does not only come from low-ability students, as the admitted student composite SAT scores at these schools did not decrease. Instead, they increased by almost 3.8%, although these estimates are not statistically significant. Robust difference-in-difference and event study models further confirm these findings and show that the gains diminish over time.