MARC Record from Library of Congress

LEADER: 02727cam a22002897a 4500
001 2007616537
003 DLC
005 20070922103008.0
007 cr |||||||||||
008 070921s2007 mau sb 000 0 eng
010 $a 2007616537
040 $aDLC$cDLC
050 00 $aHB1
100 1 $aCarpenter, Christopher$q(Christopher Scott)
245 14 $aThe effects of mandatory seatbelt laws on seatbelt use, motor vehicle fatalities, and crash-related injuries among youths$h[electronic resource] /$cChristopher S. Carpenter, Mark Stehr.
260 $aCambridge, MA :$bNational Bureau of Economic Research,$cc2007.
490 1 $aNBER working paper series ;$vworking paper 13408
538 $aSystem requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader.
538 $aMode of access: World Wide Web.
500 $aTitle from PDF file as viewed on 9/21/2007.
530 $aAlso available in print.
504 $aIncludes bibliographical references.
520 3 $a"We provide the first comprehensive assessment of the effects of mandatory seatbelt laws on self-reported seatbelt use, highway fatalities, and crash-related injuries among high school age youths using data from the Centers for Disease Control's (CDC) national, state, and local Youth Risk Behavior Surveys (YRBS) and the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) from 1991 to 2005, a period spanning over 20 changes in state seatbelt laws. Our quasi-experimental approaches isolate the independent effects of seatbelt laws net of demographic characteristics, area and year fixed effects, and smooth area-specific trends. Across all data sources, we find consistent evidence that state mandatory seatbelt laws -- particularly those permitting primary enforcement -- significantly increased seatbelt use among high school age youths by 45-80 percent, primarily at the extensive margin. Unlike previous research for adults, however, we find evidence against the selective recruitment hypothesis: seatbelt laws had consistently larger effects on those most likely to be involved in traffic accidents (drinkers, alcohol-involved drivers). We also find that mandatory seatbelt laws significantly reduced traffic fatalities and serious injuries resulting from fatal crashes by 8 and 9 percent, respectively. Our results suggest that if all states had primary enforcement seatbelt laws then regular youth seatbelt use would be nearly universal and youth fatalities would fall by about 120 per year"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site.
700 1 $aStehr, Mark.
710 2 $aNational Bureau of Economic Research.
830 0 $aWorking paper series (National Bureau of Economic Research : Online) ;$vworking paper no. 13408.
856 40 $uhttp://papers.nber.org/papers/w13408