The Returns to Regulatory Redundancy: Evidence from Tobacco

James Flynn (), Michael Pesko and Christian Saenz ()
Additional contact information
James Flynn: Department of Economics, Miami University, https://miamioh.edu/fsb/directory/?up=/directory/flynnj
Christian Saenz: Yale University, https://www.christianmsaenz.com/

No 2601, Working Papers from Department of Economics, University of Missouri

Abstract: We consider the impact of state laws that prohibit conduct already barred under federal law. In particular, we examine the effectiveness of state minimum legal sales laws for tobacco, or tobacco 21 laws, implemented after the federal T21 law in December 2019. Using difference–in–differences modeling that exploits the staggered implementation of tobacco 21 legislation (T21) in 28 states after 2019, we find that these state T21 laws consistently have little to no effect on smoking and vaping among adults ages 18 to 20, nor for high school youth. Our findings indicate that state T21 laws offer little marginal benefit under a unified federal T21 regime. We discuss voluntary compliance as a likely explanation for these findings.

Keywords: Tobacco control; minimum legal sales age; youth smoking and vaping; state vs federal regulation; policy redundancy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H75 I18 K32 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-05
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CUsBoCUpTO0J7LyN4 ... M70/view?usp=sharing (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:umc:wpaper:2601

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from Department of Economics, University of Missouri Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chao Gu ().