Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/35296
Year of Publication: 
2008
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 3903
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
Law enforcement officers are allowed to exercise a significant amount of street-level discretion in a variety of ways. In this paper, we focus on a particular prominent kind of discretionary behavior by traffic officers when issuing speeding tickets, speed discounting. Officers partially forgive motorists by writing a lower speed level than the speed that officers observe. Verifying the level of speed discounting by different groups of officers and motorists and ascertaining the presence of racial disparities in this lenient policing are the main objectives of this paper. We find that minority officers, particularly African-Americans, are harsher on all motorists but even harsher on minority motorists regarding speed discounting. The minority-on-minority disparity appears to be stronger in situations involving Hispanic officers, infrequently ticketing officers, male motorists, those driving old vehicles, and minority neighborhoods.
Subjects: 
Police discretion
disparate treatment
racial bias
speeding tickets
JEL: 
J70
K42
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size
175.35 kB





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.