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Access to broadband internet causally linked to reduction in suicides
- readthenotes1 2y agoThere was a novel written in the early 1900s that said men don't commit suicide from heartbreak but from lack of hope for money.
- eru 2y agoThe abstract already speculates that this effect might be modulated via economic well-being. Now I wonder if they also addressed correlation-vs-causation? Perhaps economic growth causes both fewer suicides and more broadband internet?
- dcre 2y agoThey say in the paper: “We find that increased access to broadband internet in a county leads to a reduction in poverty, and an increase in income, employment, and the number of employees and establishments by zip code.” However, I can’t find the part of the paper that actually justifies that claim. That doesn’t mean it’s not there, I just couldn’t find it in a quick skim.
- therabbithole 2y agoThere’s a section “Potential Mechanisms” on page 18 of the PDF. “Table 4 presents the effect of increased broadband availability on several county level economic outcomes. Each column includes all controls and fixed effects included our preferred specification. Column 1 reports that the result of a 10% increase in a county's population with access to broadband internet is a reduction in poverty rate of 0.089 percentage points. Column 2 indicates that a ten percentage point increase in broadband availability results in a reduction of unemployment in the county of 0.013 percentage points.”
- slyfox125 2y agoThat seems more likely. Or some complex interplay between those factors amongst others.
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- jitl 2y agoHaving money causally linked to reduction in suicides
- joot82 2y agobetter quality of life leads to lower wish of dying it seems, who would have thought
- lionelholt 2y agoWhat is the precise mechanism of causation?
- therabbithole 2y ago[flagged]
- underseacables 2y agoI thought it was a typo at first, and should've said "casually". Maybe there's a general correlation, but I don't see a firm causation at all.