NCJ Number
131368
Journal
Journal of Social, Political and Economic Studies Volume: 15 Issue: 4 Dated: (Winter 1990) Pages: 403-421
Date Published
1990
Length
19 pages
Annotation
An analysis of the United States government's use of drug interdiction as the main component of its efforts to address drug abuse concluded that this strategy does not appear to be a cost-effective approach to reducing drug addiction.
Abstract
The analysis used a model based on a feedback loop in which demand is relatively inelastic due to the addictive nature of most illegal drugs. Thus, increased interdiction reduces the supply, raising the street price to a level at which drug traffickers have more net money to hire more smugglers to increase the supply. Thus, a tight feedback loop tends to maintain constant supply and prices. A quantitative analysis using this model showed that even achieving the goal of an interdiction rate of 50 percent will be ineffective in reducing supply. Rates of more than 90 percent and possibly higher than 99 percent will be needed to achieve significant reductions of street supplies. Findings also suggest that interception of laundered money or the flow of money back to leaders of drug trafficking operations might be more effective at less cost. Footnotes and figures