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A comment on Including Illegal Activity in the U.S. National Economic Accounts [pdf]. Parent comment

Re:Including Illegal Activity in the U.S. National Economic ... by peterwwillis on Saturday January 04, 2020 @11:01PM (#21959552)
Going from "we don't use as much coke as in the 80's" to "the war on drugs worked" is a bit like going from "we have less teen pregnancy now than in the 90s" to "abstinence worked". It's not only ignoring a very large number of alternate factors, but it's assuming the latter is a successful strategy, when all of the evidence points to the contrary.
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Re:Including Illegal Activity in the U.S. National Economic ... by eanzenberg on Sunday January 05, 2020 @12:20AM (#21959808)
Interesting you bring up abstinence because kids are having way less sex nowadays than in the past.
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Re:Including Illegal Activity in the U.S. National Economic ... by kingkawn on Sunday January 05, 2020 @01:02AM (#21959955)
Most definitely not because of abstinence education
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Re:Including Illegal Activity in the U.S. National Economic ... by unishark on Sunday January 05, 2020 @01:37AM (#21960050)
Because proving causation is always difficult if not impossible? Or because in both cases we have a personal bias that makes us not want those programs to have worked, despite not being able to disprove causation either?
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Re:Including Illegal Activity in the U.S. National Economic ... by eivarv on Sunday January 05, 2020 @07:23AM (#21960970)
Because in neither case has anyone actually even made a coherent argument for a causal effect that doesn't ignore all the other factors? Besides, when "all the evidence points to the contrary" is usually a bad sign...

There are a lot of things you aren't able to disprove that are (probably) not true.

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Re:Including Illegal Activity in the U.S. National Economic ... by caublestone on Sunday January 05, 2020 @12:52AM (#21959912)
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/national...
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