Dr. Kim鈥檚 research offered perspectives on the state of economic inequality around the world.
鈥淚n many OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries, inequality is at its highest level in thirty years and continues to rise.鈥� She also discussed the differing effects that globalization has had across the globe: globalization has led to increased economic inequality in most countries, especially highly developed countries like Korea and the U.S., but has also led to decreases in economic inequality in a few countries like Turkey and Greece.

Kim鈥檚 work also shows the negative effects of high levels of income inequality, particularly the harmful effects it can have on employment rates and the labor market. She demonstrated that as inequality increases, life expectancy tends to decrease. Similarly, her work shows that as the top one percent of income earners dominate more of the market in a country, societal evaluations of happiness decrease.

Kim points to 鈥渋nclusive growth,鈥� economic growth that is distributed across society, as a potential solution that could lead to more economic mobility and more opportunities for the working class. Research shows that when governments decide to create policies that encourage inclusive growth, equity of opportunities increases and everyone gets to participate in the economic benefits that come from the economic growth.

Kim believes education can 鈥渂e a force of convergence,鈥� to decrease the income divide. However, she notes, governments must first improve the equality of education and expand access to higher level education. One way she sees of doing this is decreasing the resource gap and providing more centralized funding for education, pre-kindergarten through college.

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Since the beginning of 2018, Abraham has co-authored eight publications, including two for which she was the principal researcher.

In 鈥淕eographic disparities in availability of opioid use disorder treatment for Medicaid enrollees,鈥� Abraham and her co-authors found that there are several clusters of counties in the U.S. that see higher rates of opioid use disorder and yet have a lower than average amount of opioid treatment providers that accept Medicaid. These county clusters occur most frequently in the Southeast, including Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee.

This disparity between the rate of opioid use disorder and opioid treatment providers results in a treatment gap for Medicaid enrollees. Because of this, Abraham and her co-authors are encouraging policymakers to consider strategies that will increase access to opioid treatment for Medicaid enrollees.

Abraham鈥檚 other article, 鈥淪tate-Targeted Funding and Technical Assistance to Increase Access to Medication Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder,鈥� discusses a way that policy makers may be able to increase access to opioid use disorder medications. Abraham and her co-authors show that state-targeted funding was associated with an increase in the availability of naltrexone and buprenorphine, two medications that have been proven to reduce opioid use, withdrawal and craving, infectious disease transmission, and treatment dropout.

Abraham has been studying the substance use disorder treatment system since completing a postdoc at UGA funded by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA). Dr. Abraham hopes to continue doing research to reduce the stigma of addiction and improve care for people who suffer from substance use disorder.

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