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A Tale of Repetition: Lessons from Florida Restaurant Inspections

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  • Ginger Zhe Jin
  • Jungmin Lee

Abstract

This paper examines the role of repetition in government regulation using Florida restaurant inspection data from 2003 to 2010. In the raw data, inspectors new to inspected restaurants tend to report 27% more violations than repeat inspectors. After ruling out regulatory capture and endogenous inspector rotation as potential explanations, we find that the new-repeat gap is best explained by the following two effects: first, restaurants target compliance in response to heterogenous stringency and tastes of different inspectors; second, inspectors pay greater attention in their first visit than in subsequent visits. After controlling for heterogenous inspector criteria, we find that a new inspector reports 13-18% more violations than the second visit of the previous inspector, likely due to a higher level of attention. Counterfactual simulations highlight the importance of inspector training and rotation in regulatory outcomes.

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  • Ginger Zhe Jin & Jungmin Lee, 2014. "A Tale of Repetition: Lessons from Florida Restaurant Inspections," NBER Working Papers 20596, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:20596
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    Cited by:

    1. Matthew Philip Makofske, 2020. "The Effect of Information Salience on Product Quality: Louisville Restaurant Hygiene and Yelp.com," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 68(1), pages 52-92, March.
    2. Kovács, Balázs & Lehman, David W. & Carroll, Glenn R., 2020. "Grade inflation in restaurant hygiene inspections: Repeated interactions between inspectors and restaurateurs," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    3. Matthew P. Makofske, 2024. "Disclosure policy design and regulatory agent behavior," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 106(1), pages 118-144, January.
    4. Marion, Justin & West, Jeremy, 2024. "Socioeconomic Disparities in Privatized Pollution Remediation: Evidence from Toxic Chemical Spills," Santa Cruz Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt3d68r0jt, Department of Economics, UC Santa Cruz.
    5. Makofske, Matthew Philip, 2021. "Spoiled food and spoiled surprises: Inspection anticipation and regulatory compliance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 190(C), pages 348-365.
    6. D. Mark Anderson & Kerwin Kofi Charles & Michael McKelligott & Daniel I. Rees, 2022. "Safeguarding Consumers Through Minimum Quality Standards: Milk Inspections and Urban Mortality, 1880-1910," NBER Working Papers 30063, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Anderson, D. Mark & Charles, Kerwin Kofi & McKelligott, Michael & Rees, Daniel I., 2022. "Safeguarding Consumers through Minimum Quality Standards: Milk Inspections and Urban Mortality, 1880-1910," IZA Discussion Papers 15295, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. Makofske, Matthew Philip, 2019. "Inspection regimes and regulatory compliance: How important is the element of surprise?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 177(C), pages 30-34.
    9. Ginger Zhe Jin & Jungmin Lee, 2014. "Inspection technology, detection, and compliance: evidence from Florida restaurant inspections," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 45(4), pages 885-917, December.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D02 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Institutions: Design, Formation, Operations, and Impact
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • K32 - Law and Economics - - Other Substantive Areas of Law - - - Energy, Environmental, Health, and Safety Law
    • L51 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - Economics of Regulation

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