Rational Drivers, Irrational Enforcers, and Road Safety
Abstract: taly shows one of the highest level of road fatalities across European countries. Speeding is ascertained to be the first cause for motorways fatal accidents. In order to increase road safety, in 2001 the Italian Parliament enabled the Government to review the traffic code in force and to adopt, in addition to the already existing monetary sanctions, a penalty system based on demerit points, which would have come into force on July 2003. Using Italian data, this article presents an econometric investigation of the effects the latter produced on speeding infractions and mortal accidents. Our main finding is that the coming into force of the Italian DPS produced only a temporary and weak effect on the drivers' speeding behavior, as well as on the number of fatal accidents, while the announcement of the decision of the Italian Government to introduce it produced a stronger and more lasting deterrent effect on the former. The coming into force of the Italian DPS has been prevented by exerting a lasting deterrent effect on speeding behaviors because drivers' learning about the effective probability of being detected made them perceive the new measure' s sanctioning aims less credible. Data on the implemented generic enforcement support this hypothesis. In addition, we claim that the credibility of the new point license system has been also treathened by the Italian DPS' s specific functioning modalities.
