Thursday, August 6, 2009

Use of Indifference curves/isoquants to show anti terror policy effects







This article posted sometime back , was been taken off due to some errors that were noted . A rewritten version has nowbeen be posted (aug 18).


CLICK ON GRAPHS FOR GREATER CLARITY


  • This article shows how some of the conclusions of previous two articles can be deduced by extending Indifference curve approach of consumer theory.( as against previous version of this article, we need to assume that terrorists want to maintain same level of terror intensity- shown by each Iso-Terror curve to properly study effect of different situations/policy)

    The graphs 1 above shows indifference curves as used in consumer theory. Each Indifference curve shows combination of bundles of X,Y that give same satisfaction to a consumer. Higher levels shows higher levels of satisfaction. The negative slope shows that for each unit reduction of a commodity Y, increase in X is required to maintain same level of satisfaction. Declining slope is outcome of assumption of declining marginal satisfaction from each additional unit of a good ( hence requiring increasing substitution of the other good) The line shows the relative prices of the two goods(slope) and the budget of consumer(intercept distance). If price of good X rises ceteris paribus, line becomes steeper and optimal bundle for consumer consist of fewer X and fewer or more Y(depending on nature of Y). The same logic applies to production of any good say bread, butter, guns or any produced good which uses combination of two factors of production labour and capital. In production theory, Indifference curves are called Isoquants ( Iso production curves).

    We extend and apply this concept to analyzing terrorist acts as shown in graphs 2,3,4.
    Terrorists acts can be targeted at enemy country or other places of enemy location (other Foreign countries, graph 2), either frequent low intensity attacks or high intensity infrequent attacks(graph 3) , involve low domestic component/inputs/support or high domestic inputs(graph 4) ( here domestic component means support from sources based in target country)


  • When a country tightens domestic security, cost/risk of failed of attacks rises shifting to more attacks in foreign countries as slope of line indicating relative cost of in-country and out-country attacks shifts more in favour of out- country attacks. Thus High vigilance Countries like US and Israel face highest threat in foreign locations on regular basis ( embassies, tourist spots)-GRAPH 2


  • Higher security for same reason leads to fewer but more intense attacks( graphs 3)

  • If cost of domestic support is increased through whistle blowing or other legal acts, more attacks will have fewer domestic support components and thus will be closer to borders. Incidentally perhaps we can conclude that by location of attacks we can conclude where an attacks has predominantly local or foreign origin in conjunction with other evidence. ( the analogy that can be given here : if domestic component price of any imported good rises, sellers will find it easier to sell high import content products than before - more attacks that are planned outside the country) -GRAPH 4

  • More micro level conclusions can be inferred ( in conjunction with MAX-OBJ –FN explained below in previous articles) –which areas, which locations, cities, times have higher probability as also which mode/routes( land/sea/air) may be preferred by terrorists)









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