An economic model of Adopt-a-Highway programmes

Abstract

In many jurisdictions around the world there occurs a phenomenon that is not only unique but defies a simple explanation. This activity involves the private provision of a public good by individuals, acting in groups, in response to the illegal actions of other individuals. This private provision of a public good involves cleaning litter from roads and highways and manifests itself through an ‘Adopt-a-Highway’ or road programme sanctioned by local, state, provincial and even national governments. The goal of this paper is to demonstrate that there is a rational economic framework to explain the illegal activity of dumping waste on a roadside and the response by those who participate in an Adopt-a-Highway programme. Our model provides a starting point for considering policies which might enhance the formation and effectiveness of this volunteer activity.

Keywords:

• environmental economics
• public goods

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Steve Margolis and James Amegashie for helpful comments. A referee also provided a very helpful review of an earlier version of the paper.

Notes

1. These include attracting animals to the site, jeopardising the safety of motorists, visual pollution, clogged drainage ditches resulting in flooding and the public costs of cleaning culverts.

2. Those levels that are excessive is demonstrated by the resources allocated for (1) public sector promotional campaigns urging drivers not to litter, (2) public expenditures on road crews to clean up litter and (3) the promotion of volunteer groups to keep roadsides free of litter.

3. Keeping the waste in the car creates unpleasant odour and can potentially soil upholstery leading to the allocation of time to clean the car or pay to have it cleaned.

4. While there is some dispute regarding the origin of the AHP, most sources state that the state of Texas launched the first programme in 1984. By 1999, almost one million volunteers were picking up litter along the roads in 48 US states. In addition, the programme had spread to Canada and several other countries. Based on a more recent survey, in 2008, there were almost 70,000 AHP groups operating in six countries and gathering litter on more than 200,000 miles of roads. Details from the 1999 survey can be found at www.okladot.state.ok.us/beauty/adopt/info.htm, while data for 2008 is available from http://www.adopt-a-highway.org/conference09/iaahasurvey2008.pdf.

5. This behaviour falls into the classic case of the private production of public goods (Demsetz 1970). In this case, however, the incentive to participate in such an activity is enhanced by government sanction and recognition of such behaviour. Whether this leads to a Pareto optimal private provision of the public good is beyond the scope of this paper (Bagnoli and Mckee 1991).

6. Fullerton and Kinnaman (1995) demonstrate that the optimal strategy to reduce illegal dumping is a deposit refund system involving a tax on all output plus a rebate on proper disposal through either recycling or garbage collection. For much of the roadside waste, e.g. food containers, paper cups, wrappers, leftover food, such a strategy is not practical.

7. A finite lower bound for α is reasonable given the assumption that each driver is endowed with an initial quantity of in-vehicle garbage and suffers at least some disutility from its presence regardless of preference for in-vehicle garbage.

8. For example, if f(α, β) was the uniform distribution (i.e. f(α, β) = θ, a constant), this would mean .

9. Allowing for heterogeneous levels of disutility from roadside garbage could be introduced to the model with no qualitative implications to our results. Also note that, since each person's contribution to aggregate roadside garbage is considered to be ‘small,’ disutility from roadside garbage is the same across all three decisions.

10. A discussion of the underlying theory can be found in Andreoni (1990). Bekkers and Wiepking (2011, p. 938) note that the category of motives labelled ‘warm glow’ can arise from psychological experiences including ‘alleviate(d) feelings of guilt (avoid punishment), acting in line with a social norm or feel(ing) good for acting in line with a specific (prosocial, altruistic) self-image.’ We use the parameters β and γ to reflect these various sources of ‘warm glow,’ the feeling from acting in line with a social norm (i.e. it is wrong to litter) and the enhancement of self-image through the altruistic and prosocial acts associated with joining an AHP programme.

11. The two parameters β and γ may be (positively) related due to a general environmental sensitivity. Such a relationship was noted by Rondinelli and Vastag (2000, p. 505) who note, in the context of employee training in the context of ISO 14001 guidelines, that there was a spillover effect in that ‘increased awareness also resulted in many employees volunteering for the plant's “Adopt a Highway” program.’ Thus, it may well be the case that for many individuals, the psychological experiences from acting in line with a social norm (not littering) and the personal fulfillment from altruistic or prosocial behaviour (joining an AHP programme) are related.

12. This cost can be reduced by certain government decisions, such as providing groups with signs to put on the roadside to warn drivers of their presence, provision of vests that increase visibility of individuals, etc.

13. Evidence on the warm-glow effect and group size depends on certain parameters in experimental research. It is not unrealistic in this situation for the individual to experience increased warm glow due to group participation since there is a real, measurable result from the group. See Stahl and Haruby (2006).

14. One could assume that if this option was significantly expanded it would generate a cost that would have to be passed on to all drivers in the form of some type of tax.