States’ Spending for Public Welfare and Their Suicide Rates, 1960 to 1995: What is the Problem?

Drawing on Durkheim’s theory of social integration, this discussion reports on findings from a pooled time-series analysis of states’ spending for public welfare & their suicide rates. The major hypothesis was that states’ suicide rates would increase with decreases in per capita spending for public welfare. It was found that suicide rates increased in states that reduced their per capita expenditures for public welfare during the observational period. The influence of divorce on suicide was the most persistent & pronounced variable, followed by the percentage of whites in states’ populations. Implications of these findings are discussed. (71 refs)