The Economics of Drug Abuse: a Quantitative Assessment of Drug Demand

The behavioral economics of ketamine consumption. A. Despite differences in the doses of ketamine made available to rhesus monkeys (green, 0.03 mg/kg; blue, 0.1 mg/kg; yellow, 0.3 mg/kg), the demand curves and economic parameters (e.g., P_max) that describe usage of the drug are constant and thus descriptive for ketamine. B. Given that unit price P is equal to FR (expenditure) per dose (D), and given a constant P_max for ketamine, it becomes clear that the monkeys must work harder at lower doses to maintain their intake of ketamine. [See (22).]