A Labor Theoretic Analysis of the Criminal Choice

Although many criminal choice problems may be viewed within an expanded labor choice framework, care must be exercised if these problems are to be interpreted in terms of strictly monetary costs and benefits. We show below that by not fully specifying their choice problems, and therefore the transformation between what is inherently a multiattribute decision problem and the wealth-only problem, Becker, Ehrlich, and Sjoquist are led to conclusions which are valid only in very special cases. In general, we show that plausible preference restrictions are not sufficient to generate unambiguous supply results, a result that should come as no surprise since it is the same situation that confronts the investigator in most household allocation problems. Therefore, policy prescriptions in this area, as in the tax incentive area, do not follow from theory but rather require empirical determination of relative magnitudes

Stochastic Reserve Losses

In an article in the September, 1961, issue of the A.merican Economic Review, Daniel Orr and W. G. Mellon introduced the notion of uncertainty into the well-known comparative static analysis of bank credit expansion. (1) This paper discusses their findings, the nature of their assumptions, and some possible extensions of their results

Law Enforcement Agencies as Multiproduct Firms: Correcting Some Misconceptions

The comment by Pyle and Deadman [PD] on our paper deals with several points which arise regularly in empirical applications of economic theory and especially in applications in which firms do not operate in traditional market places. Their first point concerns the appropriate definition of output in law enforcement agencies: Is the final output deterrence of future crimes, solving existing crimes, both, or something else? PD argue that deterrence {crime prevention) is the primary output of law enforcement agencies, and from society\u27s perspective, this is undoubtedly true. But as we attempted to make clear in our paper, we were interested in modeling the decision process of an individual agency. Conversations, both with academics working in the area of law enforcement and with practitioners, convinced us that on a day to day basis, police departments were much more likely to be interested in solving crimes than in deterrence

The multi-output translog production cost function: the case of law enforcement agencies

In this paper we study the relationship between costs, input prices and activity levels in a sample of approximately thirty medium sized city police departments for the years 1968, 69, 71 and 73. Our interest lies in determining the functional structure of law enforcement production technology

The supply of legal and illegal activity: A choice theoretic analysis

We will show below that failure to fully specify the choice problem and therefore the transformation between what is inherently a multi-attribute decision problem and the wealth only problem has led Becker, Ehrlich, and Sjoquist to conclusions which are valid only in very special cases. In general, we show that plausible preference restrictions are not sufficient to generate unambiguous supply results, a result that should come as no surprise since it is the same situation that confronts the investigator in most household allocation problems. Therefore, policy prescriptions in this area, as in the tax incentive area do not follow from theory but rather require empirical determination of relative magnitudes

Technical and allocative efficiency: preliminary ideas toward discrimination between the hypotheses

Two levels of efficiency lie behind the supply and demand equations of neoclassical economic theory. First, firms are assumed to be technically efficient, in that maximum output is obtained from any given mix of inputs. Second, firms are assumed to be allocatively (or price) efficient, in that input and output mixes are chosen such that profits are maximum. Although it has often been argued that firms must be efficient in a competitive economy, only a very limited amount of work has been directed to measuring the extent of any inefficiencies. In this paper we provide a framework for such measurements with a special emphasis on decomposing observed inefficiencies into technical and allocative components

The Allocation of Effort Under Uncertainty: The Case of Risk Averse Behavior

This paper analyzes the labor supply decision of a single economic agent within the expected utility framework. Two formulations of the problem are considered: pure income uncertainty and wage rate uncertainty. In each case, the effects on the labor supply decision of changes in both expected returns and the dispersion of returns (about a constant mean) are investigated. Arguments concerning the disincentive effects of uncertainty are shown not to be unambiguously supported by theory

Stochastic Reserve Losses: A Rejoinder

In an article in the September, 1961, issue of the A.merican Economic Review, Daniel Orr and W. G. Mellon introduced the notion of uncertainty into the well-known comparative static analysis of bank credit expansion. (1) This paper discusses their findings, the nature of their assumptions, and some possible extensions of their results

A theory of household behavior under uncertainty

In this paper we are concerned with the effects of uncertainty on household decisions. In particular we are interested in the response of a single economic agent\u27s factor allocations to changes in the amount of uncertainty with which the agent\u27s beliefs regarding his income are held. For problems of choice under uncertainty the recent work of Arrow [1], Sandmo [9, 10, 11], Leland [5, 6], Stiglitz [12], and others clearly testifies to the power of the expected utility hypothesis as an analytical framework. In what follows two models are examined in which the agent is assumed to be confronting a two period planning horizon and making a joint labor-saving supply decision in the expected utility sense. Although Sandmo [10] and Leland [5] have investigated the effects of uncertainty on the savings decision and Block and Heineke [4] have investigated the effects of uncertainty on the labor decision, to our knowledge no general treatment of the effects of uncertainty on the joint labor-savings decision has been done. It will be shown that the assumptions underlying the Sandmo-Leland analysis are not sufficient to generate their savings results in the more general household model. Additional assumptions are presented that are sufficient not only for the Sandmo-Leland savings results, but which also provide the requisite preference information for an analysis of the labor decision

Law Enforcement Agencies as Multiproduct Firms: An Econometric Investigation of Production Costs

In this paper we study the relationship between costs, input prices and activity levels in a sample of approximately thirty medium sized city police departments for the years 1968, 69, 71, and 73. Our interest lies in determining the functional structure of law enforcement production technology