Does Price Really Matter? The Relationship between Heroin Price and Purity in Australia and the Ramifications for International Drug Enforcement

Hank Prunckun

Global Crime, 2007, vol. 8, issue 4, 367-380

Abstract: This study determines the relationship between the black market price for heroin and its corresponding purity in Australia for the period from July 1996 to June 2003 (seven years). The study used regression and correlation analyses to test the relationship between the two variables. If a negative relationship was found, then it would suggest that law enforcement operations were effective. However, the study determined that there was a near-zero correlation ( r = 0.02) at commercial level (i.e. weights of one ounce) but a moderate relationship ( r = 0.37) at user level (i.e. weights of 1 g). From this it was concluded that Australian law enforcement operations targeting commercial quantities were neither effective nor ineffective; but operations targeting street-level users were noticeably ineffective. To improve success at both levels, the study put forward the proposition that more aggressive enforcement operations in front of the international Customs barrier may be needed.

Date: 2007
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/17440570701739736 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:fglcxx:v:8:y:2007:i:4:p:367-380

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/FGLC20

DOI: 10.1080/17440570701739736

Access Statistics for this article

Global Crime is currently edited by Carlo Morselli

More articles in Global Crime from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().