Niclas A. Krüger

Good times are drinking times: empirical evidence on business cycles and alcohol sales in Sweden 1861-2000

This article studies the relationship between the business cycle and alcohol sales in Sweden using a data set for the years 1861–2000. Using wavelet-based band-pass filtering, it is found that there is a pro-cyclical relationship, i.e. alcohol sales increases in short-term economic upturns. Using moving window techniques, we see that the pro-cyclical relationship holds over the entire time period. We also find that alcohol sales are a long-memory process with nonstationary behaviour, i.e. a shock in alcohol sales has persistent effects.

The impact of real options on willingness to pay for mortality risk reductions.

Public investments are dynamic in nature, and decision making must account for the uncertainty, irreversibility and potential for future learning. In this paper we adapt the theory for investment under uncertainty for a public referendum setting and perform the first empirical test to show that estimates of the value of a statistical life (VSL) from stated preference surveys are highly dependent on the inclusion of the option value. Our results indicate an option value of a major economic magnitude. This implies that previously reported VSL estimates, used in societal benefit-cost analysis of health investments, are exaggerated.

Fatal Connections-Socioeconomic Determinants of Road Accident Risk and Drunk Driving in Sweden

PROBLEM In recent years a considerable number of papers have examined socioeconomic factors influencing the number and the outcome of traffic accidents. There is however more research needed to confirm the previous results in order to generalize them and a need to examine additional factors that might have an impact. METHOD This paper uses both regional panel data and national time series data combined with filtering techniques to determine what factors influence the number of accidents, the accident outcome and detected drunk driving. RESULTS Using time series data, it is found that the number of traffic fatalities increases for both per capita and per person kilometer travelled during economic booms. This indicates that the death risk rises not only because of increased mileage or motorization during booms. Using panel data, it is found that traffic fatalities decrease with unemployment, whereas personal injuries increase on a per capita basis with youth and the number of cars. In contrast to property crimes and other types of crime, drunk driving in Sweden decreases during economic contractions. DISCUSSION The main policy conclusion from our results is that resources for safety measures should not be spend uniformly across time and space. Instead, safety measures should be concentrated to areas with a high share of young people and to periods with low unemployment. The results of the time series analysis suggest that factors other than increased mileage during booms contribute to the higher rate of fatalities during good times. Increased risk taking, such as drunk driving, might be an explanatory factor. IMPACT ON INDUSTRY The results might be interesting for safety-oriented car and truck producers as well for developers of traffic safety products, since the results indicate in what regional markets and under what market conditions their products are most needed.

The impact of economic fluctuations on crime: a multiscale analysis

In this article we use a wavelet-based approach in order to analyse the periodicity in the relationship between economic fluctuations and different types of crime. All examined types of crime share seasonal behaviour with variations of real economic activity. Removing the intrayear dynamics, we find that the effect of real economic activity is different between different types of crime. We conclude that property crimes, violence crimes and sex crimes are countercyclical. The reverse is true for both alcohol/drug-related crimes and economic crimes, because there is a highly significant increase of these types of crime during economic expansions.

The impact of a novel preventive care service on the incidence of hip fractures among the elderly

ObjectiveWe wanted to determine the impact of a novel preventive care service (PCS) employing home visits by non-physician experts on the incidence of hip fractures among the elderly.MethodsWe estimated an ARMA model for the time series of hip fractures in the Höganäs municipality in Sweden for the years 1987–2008. By means of intervention analysis and out of sample forecasts, we estimated the short- and long-term impact of the novel preventive care service.ResultsWe found that there is a statistically significant short-term impact of the PCS with about 8.27 fewer incidents of hip fracture. This corresponds to a long-term effect of about 3.74 fewer incidents of hip fracture per year.ConclusionSince we found a statistically highly significant impact, we concluded that there was an effect on the number of hip fractures. Considering the magnitude of the effect, we found that the examined preventive care service is an economically efficient measure.