Quantifying the social costs and benefits of tobacco in Estonia

2020 ◽  
pp. tobaccocontrol-2019-055419
Author(s):  
Indrek Saar ◽  
Helle Koitla
Keyword(s):  
Law Enforcement ◽  
Healthcare Costs ◽  
Social Cost ◽  
Costs And Benefits ◽  
Illicit Trade ◽  
Productivity Losses ◽  
The Social ◽  
Fiscal System ◽  
Direct Healthcare Costs ◽  
Social Costs And Benefits

BackgroundThe tobacco cost literature has predominantly focused on estimating direct healthcare costs and productivity losses from morbidity and mortality. This study places a greater focus on the effects that arise through the fiscal system, illicit trade and fire accidents to estimate the social costs and benefits of tobacco use in Estonia in 2018.MethodsA prevalence-based cost-of-illness approach was used, relying on data from the 2017–2018 period. Age-specific tobacco-attributable fractions were employed to estimate the costs and benefits of tobacco-related morbidity and mortality. Data on mortality, morbidity and healthcare costs were received from the National Institute of Health Development and the Estonian Health Insurance Fund. We used data for offences and fires from the Estonian Rescue Board and the Estonian Tax and Customs Board.ResultsIt was estimated that the total social cost attributable to tobacco in Estonia in 2018 was €174 million, representing 0.67% of the nation’s GDP. If future benefits are also considered, the net social cost is €78 million. While the greatest cost components are productivity losses from mortality and morbidity, the level of tobacco-related law enforcement costs are comparable to direct healthcare costs, both of which exceed €10 million annually.ConclusionsDespite the substantial social benefits arising through the fiscal system, tobacco-related costs outweighed these benefits in Estonia in 2018. In addition, a considerable portion of the economic burden of tobacco is associated with illicit trade. Therefore, the healthcare and law enforcement sectors would both benefit from effective tobacco control policies.

scholarly journals The Tolerable Cost of European Union Regulation: Leaving the EU and the Market for Politically Convenient Facts

2017 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 719-743 ◽  
Author(s):  
GARY FOOKS ◽  
TOM MILLS
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Working Conditions ◽  
Policy Instruments ◽  
Social Regulation ◽  
Costs And Benefits ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Costs And Benefits ◽  
Business Competitiveness ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Eu

AbstractEuropean Union (EU) law-making has played a key role in promoting social equity in the UK through safer working conditions, enhanced rights for workers, and by reducing environmental pollution. Concerns over its effect on business competitiveness have long been a major driver of Euroscepticism, underpinning criticism of the EU by influential opinion formers within British conservatism. The Leave Campaign argued that EU laws damage the UK economy by imposing unnecessary costs on British business, claiming that EU regulations cost the UK economy £33.3 billion per year. This paper examines the reliability of, and assumptions that underpin, aggregated estimates of the costs and benefits of EU-derived regulation, and considers how the economisation of public policy influences understanding of the social value of regulation. It brings together the findings of studies that have evaluated the accuracy of the estimated costs and benefits in formal impact assessments and analyses impact assessments of EU-derived policy instruments aimed at regulating working conditions. Our findings suggest that aggregated estimates represent poor guides to understanding the social costs and benefits of social regulation and highlight the value of discarding impact assessment estimates of costs and benefits in the context of efforts to shape social policy post-Brexit.

scholarly journals Weighing intellectual property: Can we balance the social costs and benefits of patenting?

2018 ◽  
Vol 57 (1) ◽  
pp. 140-163
Author(s):  
Mario Biagioli
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Social Costs ◽  
Costs And Benefits ◽  
Ip Protection ◽  
The Public ◽  
Clear Sense ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Law ◽  
Social Costs And Benefits ◽  
Ip Law

The scale is the most famous emblem of the law, including intellectual property (IP). Because IP rights impose social costs on the public by limiting access to protected work, the law can be justified only to the extent that, on balance, it encourages enough creation and dissemination of new works to offset those costs. The scale is thus a potent rhetorical trope of fairness and objectivity, but also an instrument the law thinks with – one that is constantly invoked to justify or to question the extent of available IP protection. The balancing act that underlies the legitimacy of IP is, however, literally impossible to perform. Because we are unable to measure the benefits that IP has for inventors or the costs it has for the public, the scale has nothing to weigh. It conveys a clear sense that IP law can be balanced, but in fact propagates only a visible simulacrum of balance – one that is as empty as it is powerful.

scholarly journals Help Wanted: Economists, Crime and Public Policy

1996 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
John J DiIulio
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Social Capital ◽  
Criminal Behavior ◽  
Costs And Benefits ◽  
Relevant Research ◽  
Crime And Punishment ◽  
Policy Debates ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Costs And Benefits ◽  
Causes Of Crime

Beginning with Gary W. Becker's (1968) article on crime and punishment, economists have contributed important theoretical insights and empirical findings to the study of criminal behavior but the influence of economists on crime-relevant research and over policy debates remains negligible. This essay summarizes some basic data on the causes of crime, the social costs and benefits of incarceration, and replenishing social capital. Work on crime by economists should become influential in setting research agendas and shaping policy debates but economists will have to roll up their sleeves, complexify their models, and confront a real-world ‘prisoner's dilemma’ or two.

scholarly journals Autonomy and Morality in DRM and Anti-Circumvention Law

1970 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 239-245
Author(s):  
Dan L. Burk ◽  
Tarleton Gillespie
Keyword(s):  
Digital Rights Management ◽  
Costs And Benefits ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Social ◽  
State Sponsorship ◽  
Management Technology ◽  
Rights Management ◽  
Information Products ◽  
Social Costs And Benefits

Digital rights management technology, or DRM, provides self-enforcing technical exclusion from pre-determined uses of informational works. Such technical exclusion may supplement or even supplant intellectual property laws. The deployment of DRM has been subsidized by laws prohibiting both disabling of technical controls and assisting others to disable technical controls. To date the public debate over deployment of DRM, has been almost entirely dominated by utilitarian arguments regarding the social costs and benefits of this technology. In this paper, we examine the moral propriety of laws endorsing and encouraging the deployment of DRM. We argue that a deontological analysis, focusing on the autonomy of information users, deserves consideration. Because DRM shifts the determination of information use from users to producers, users are denied the choice whether to engage in use or misuse of the technically protected work. State sponsorship of DRM in effect treats information users as moral incompetents, incapable of deciding the proper use of information products. This analysis militates in favor of legal penalties that recognize and encourage the exercise of autonomous choice, even by punishment of blameworthy choices, rather than the encouragement of technology that limits the autonomous choices of information users.

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