Assessing the Benefits of U.S. Customs and Border Protection Regulatory Actions to Reduce Terrorism Risks

Abstract

Executive Order (E.O.) 12866, as supplemented by E.O. 13563, requires federal agencies to evaluate the benefits, costs, and other impacts of major regulations prior to promulgation. For regulations intended to confer benefits under circumstances of extreme uncertainty, such as commonly arise in the context of homeland security, this requirement has proven especially challenging. To assist U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), a key component of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), in meeting these challenges, the RAND Corporation and Industrial Economics, Inc., conducted a workshop in November 2011, titled "Assessing the Benefits of U.S. Customs and Border Protection Regulatory Actions to Reduce Terrorism Risks," that drew together leading experts in the field of regulatory analysis and terrorism risk. Most of the ideas that emerged from the workshop pertained to qualitative modeling, quantitative modeling, or data collection. A distillation and synthesis of the emerging ideas, recurring themes, and points of contention among the participants suggested several recommendations to assist CBP in meeting the challenges of improving the benefit-cost analysis of terrorism security regulations. The appendix contains the four invited presentations and an overview: "Overview of Challenges Identified During the Development of Estimates of the Benefits of U.S. Customs and Border Protection Regulations," by Jennifer Baxter; "Applying Modeling and Simulation to Estimate Risk Reduction Benefits for Regulatory Benefit-Cost Analysis," by Tony Cheesebrough and Ryan Wise; "Using Logic Models to Assess Security Benefits," by Victoria A. Greenfield, Henry H. Willis, and Tom LaTourrette; "Characterizing Benefits of Anti-Terrorism Rules," by James K. Hammitt; and "Improving Estimation of the Benefits of Terrorism Risk Reduction: Learning from Environmental Economists?" by Carolyn Kousky. Briefing charts of each presentation are included.

Open PDF

Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 2012
Accession Number
ADA560992

Entities

People

  • Henry H. Willis
  • Tom LaTourrette
  • Victoria A. Greenfield

Organizations

  • RAND Corporation

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Biomedical
  • Engineered Resilient Systems
  • Ground and Sea Platforms

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Business Administration
  • Climate Change
  • Commerce
  • Congress
  • Cost Analysis
  • Economic Analysis
  • Environmental Protection
  • Governments
  • Health Services
  • Homeland Security
  • National Security
  • Public Administration
  • Risk
  • Risk Analysis
  • Social Welfare
  • Terrorism
  • Traumatic Stress Disorder

Readers

  • Government and Public Administration Law.
  • Life Cycle Cost Analysis
  • Military History