THE DEMAND FOR AND COST EFFECTIVENESS OF LAW ENFORCEMENT PERSONNEL IN CONTROLLING DRUNKEN DRIVING: AN ENCONOMETRIC STUDY OF NORWAY

This paper reports on an analysis of the cost effectiveness of law enforcement manpower in the control of accidental death and injury attributed to traffic violation, and in particular, drunken driving. Using the econometic techniques of simultaneous systems analysis combined with a control model presuming attempts at social cost minimization on the part of authorities which has made possible the isolation of deterrent effects in relation to the chain of events from drinking and driving to the generation of motoring accidents. This paper reports on work that extends previous research by evaluating the impact of law enforcement manpower on the sequence of events leading to accidents and then proceeding to evaluate that impact in terms of the costs of fatal and serious accidents. The case investigated is that for Norway, a country from which the extensive data needed for the evaluation is obtainable. The analysis begins with a model for the evaluation of the demand and supply of law enforcement manpower deployed to control drunken driving and other motoring offenses that are presumed to have a causal link with motoring accidents. The close fit of the model to the data, and model's forecasting power, suggests that the model can provide a reasonable basis for the calculation of cost effectiveness estimates for the efficacy of law enforcement manpower in the control of fatal and serious motoring accidents. /Author/

• Supplemental Notes:
  • Sponsored the Ford Foundation and the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Presented before the Western Economic Association Annual Meetings, Anaheim, California, June, 1977.
• Corporate Authors:

  University of California, Santa Barbara

  Community and Organization Research Institute
  Santa Barbara, CA  United States  93106
• Authors:
  • VOTEY, H L
• Publication Date: 1977-6

Media Info

• Features: Figures; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 25 p.

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Cost effectiveness; Drunk drivers; Drunk driving; Econometric models; Fatalities; Forecasting; Law enforcement; Personnel; Prevention; Safety
• Subject Areas: Highways; Safety and Human Factors; Security and Emergencies; Society;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00168038
• Record Type: Publication
• Source Agency: National Safety Council Safety Research Info Serv
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Mar 29 1978 12:00AM