Download Fundamentals of Policy Analysis: Common Errors in Decision Making and Resource Allocation and more Assignments Introduction to Public Administration in PDF only on Docsity! 1 PPA 730-10: Fundamentals of Policy Analysis SOLUTIONS to Introductory problems I. Errors in decisionmaking In each situation, which common error in analysis or decisionmaking is being committed? For each, give a short explanation or example to support your answer. In some cases, more than one error may be applicable; pick the one that seems most obvious to you. 1. A 1950s RAND Corporation study found that cities with above-average crime rates also tended to have above- average sized police forces. It concluded that crime rates could be lowered by reducing the size of the police force Either the association-causation fallacy or the ceteris paribus fallacy is correct. Association-causation: More police are in response to more criminals, who are responsible for the increased crime. Police are associated with crime, but criminals are the ones actually causing it. Ceteris paribus: The conclusion doesn't hold the number of criminals constant. Presumably, a city with more police but the same number of criminals (hence the same level of poverty, education, population, etc.) would have less crime, not more. 2. Drunk driving offenses have been reduced dramatically in areas that have instituted a policy of setting up roadblocks and randomly stopping motorists. Many say that society is better off as a result of such a policy. If this is true, we should be better off still if police stop and check every motorist every day. Fallacy of composition. With the present policy, the cost to the individual is minimal: he or she is very unlikely to be the one stopped. However, the police presence is having a deterrent effect on drunk driving that makes the benefits high. If everyone is stopped every day, the cost will almost certainly be raised above the benefit to the average person. 3. $40,000 is too much to pay a police officer, some say: Pay them all $20,000 instead and you’ll be able to hire twice as many on the same budget. This is a good policy because it results in so much greater police protection than before. Ignoring secondary effects. You may have twice as many police, but the people attracted to the force may be less capable (because the $40,000-a-year officers may not be attracted to the lower-paid positions) and more open to corruption. 4. The city has already purchased the architectural plans for a new convention center downtown. However, an SU economics professor points out that building a concert hall on the site instead would actually generate much more in benefits. The mayor’s office decides to go with the convention center anyway, because so much money has already been invested in it. Failing to ignore sunk costs. The architectural plans are a cost the city incurs either way. Go with the plan that yields higher benefits. 5. A local foundation has just given a downtown building to the city. Bureaucratic inefficiency results in its sitting empty for the whole first year, but a city official is quoted as saying that it’s no loss to taxpayers because the building was free. Ignoring the implicit costs (part of opportunity cost). The city could have rented the building out for a certain income, or gotten some public benefit by using it itself but for the inefficiency. This is a loss to taxpayers who don't get either benefit. II. Resources in production
