IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/2301.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Breath Testing and the Demand for Drunk Driving

Author

Listed:
  • Henry Saffer
  • Frank Chaloupka

Abstract

This paper presents an empirical investigation of the effect of a preliminary breath test law on drunk driving behavior. A preliminary breath test law reduces the procedural problems associated with obtaining evidence of drunk driving and thus increases the probability that a drunk driver will be arrested. In 1985, only 23 states had a preliminary breath test law. According to the theory of deterrence, increasing the probability of arrest for drunk driving will reduce the future occurrence of this behavior. The data set employed to test the theory is a time series from 1980 to 1985 of cross sections of the 48 contiguous states. Four highway mortality rates are used as measures of drunk driving. The effect of the breath test law was estimated using four independent variable models and 12 dummy variable models. The four independent variable models were also estimated using Leamer's specification test. The purpose of using these alternative specifications and Leamer's specification test was to examine the breath test coefficients for specification bias. The econometric results show that the passage of a breath test law has a significant deterrent effect on drunk driving. Simulations with these results suggest that if all states had a preliminary breath test law, highway mortality could be reduced by about 2000 deaths per year.

Suggested Citation

  • Henry Saffer & Frank Chaloupka, 1987. "Breath Testing and the Demand for Drunk Driving," NBER Working Papers 2301, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:2301
    Note: EH
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w2301.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gary S. Becker, 1974. "Crime and Punishment: An Economic Approach," NBER Chapters, in: Essays in the Economics of Crime and Punishment, pages 1-54, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Henry Saffer & Michael Grossman, 1986. "Beer Taxes, the Legal Drinking Age, and Youth Motor Vehicle Fatalities," NBER Working Papers 1914, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Saffer, Henry & Grossman, Michael, 1987. "Drinking Age Laws and Highway Mortality Rates: Cause and Effect," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 25(3), pages 403-417, July.
    4. Lave, Charles A, 1985. "Speeding, Coordination, and the 55 MPH Limit," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 75(5), pages 1159-1164, December.
    5. Leamer, Edward E & Leonard, Herman B, 1983. "Reporting the Fragility of Regression Estimates," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 65(2), pages 306-317, May.
    6. Peltzman, Sam, 1975. "The Effects of Automobile Safety Regulation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 83(4), pages 677-725, August.
    7. McPheters, Lee R & Mann, Robert & Schlagenhauf, Don, 1984. "Economic Response to a Crime Deterrence Program: Mandatory Sentencing for Robbery with a Firearm," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 22(4), pages 550-570, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Blattenberger, Gail & Fowles, Richard & Loeb, Peter D., 2013. "Determinants of motor vehicle crash fatalities using Bayesian model selection methods," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 112-122.
    2. Keeler, Theodore E., 1993. "Highway Safety, Economic Behavior, and Driving Environment," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt9c27z2z1, University of California Transportation Center.
    3. McCarthy, Patrick S., 1999. "Public policy and highway safety: a city-wide perspective," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(2), pages 231-244, March.
    4. Daniel Albalate, 2013. "The Road against Fatalities: Infrastructure Spending vs. Regulation?," ERSA conference papers ersa13p221, European Regional Science Association.
    5. Jan Eeckhout & Nicola Persico & Petra E. Todd, 2010. "A Theory of Optimal Random Crackdowns," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(3), pages 1104-1135, June.
    6. Steven D. Levitt, 2008. "Evidence that Seat Belts Are as Effective as Child Safety Seats in Preventing Death for Children Aged Two and Up," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(1), pages 158-163, February.
    7. Steven D. Levitt & Jack Porter, 2001. "Sample Selection In The Estimation Of Air Bag And Seat Belt Effectiveness," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 83(4), pages 603-615, November.
    8. Ruhm, Christopher J., 1996. "Alcohol policies and highway vehicle fatalities," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 435-454, August.
    9. Tadashi Yamada, 1985. "The Crime Rate and the Condition of the Labor Market: A Vector Autoregressive Model," NBER Working Papers 1782, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Cook, Philip J. & Moore, Michael J., 2000. "Alcohol," Handbook of Health Economics, in: A. J. Culyer & J. P. Newhouse (ed.), Handbook of Health Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 30, pages 1629-1673, Elsevier.
    11. Guha, Brishti & Guha, Ashok S., 2012. "Crime and moral hazard: Does more policing necessarily induce private negligence?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 115(3), pages 455-459.
    12. Antonio Nicita & Simona Benedettini, 2012. "The Costs of Avoiding Accidents.Selective Compliance and the 'Peltzman Effect' in Italy," Department of Economics University of Siena 631, Department of Economics, University of Siena.
    13. Paul J. Gertler & Manisha Shah, 2011. "Sex Work and Infection: What's Law Enforcement Got to Do with It?," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 54(4), pages 811-840.
    14. Peter D. Loeb & William A. Clarke, 2005. "The Determinants of Truck Accidents in the United States," Working Papers Rutgers University, Newark 2005-002, Department of Economics, Rutgers University, Newark.
    15. Jackson, C. Kirabo & Owens, Emily Greene, 2011. "One for the road: Public transportation, alcohol consumption, and intoxicated driving," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(1), pages 106-121.
    16. Cummins, J David & Phillips, Richard D & Weiss, Mary A, 2001. "The Incentive Effects of No-Fault Automobile Insurance," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 44(2), pages 427-464, October.
    17. W J Hurley & J Brimberg & A Pavlov, 2009. "Optimal thresholds for fining speeders for a stationary speed-check operation when the traffic intensity is low," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 60(9), pages 1154-1159, September.
    18. Elizabeth Kopits & Maureen Cropper, 2008. "Why Have Traffic Fatalities Declined in Industrialised Countries?: Implications for Pedestrians and Vehicle Occupants," Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, University of Bath, vol. 42(1), pages 129-154, January.
    19. Patrick S. McCarthy, 1991. "HIGHWAY SAFETY AND THE 65‐mph SPEED LIMIT," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 9(4), pages 82-92, October.
    20. Gregory DeAngelo & Gary Charness, 2012. "Deterrence, expected cost, uncertainty and voting: Experimental evidence," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 44(1), pages 73-100, February.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:2301. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.