BATTER UP! MORAL HAZARD AND THE EFFECTS OF THE DESIGNATED HITTER RULE ON HIT BATSMEN

doi:10.1111/j.1465-7295.1997.tb02032.x

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Wiley InterScience

Economic Inquiry

Volume 35 Issue 3, Pages 555 - 561

Published Online: 30 Oct 2007

A Journal of the Western Economic Association International

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BATTER UP! MORAL HAZARD AND THE EFFECTS OF THE DESIGNATED HITTER RULE ON HIT BATSMEN

BRIAN L. GOFF ¹ , WILLIAM F. SHUGHART II ² and ROBERT D. TOLLISON* ^, ³

¹ Professor of Economics, Department of Economics Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green Phone 1-502-745-3855, Fax 1-502-745-3893 E-mail brian.goff@wku.edu ² Professor of Economics and Self Free Enterprise Chairholder, Department of Economics & Finance, University of Mississippi, Oxford Phone 1-601-232-7579, Fax 1-601-232-5238 E-mail shughart@bus.olemiss.edu ³ Duncan Black Professor of Economics, Center for Study of Public Choice, George Mason University Fairfax, Va., Phone 1-703-993-23 15 Fax 1-703-993-2323

*We thank Mike Belongia of the University of Mississippi and Keith Carlson of the St. Louis Fed for help in gaining access to the hit batsmen data that are the paper's centerpiece and Pete Palmer, co-editor of Total Baseball, for making it available to us. Valuable comments were provided by Robert McCormick, Keith Womer, Luke Froeb, Fred McChesney, and seminar participants at the University of Kansas and the University of Mississippi. The suggestions of Mark Zupan and two anonymous referees were especially helpful in improving the paper. Tim Greer and Robert Trimm supplied able rebrch assistance. We are also grateful to James M. Buchanan for earlier discussions which led to the development of this paper. As is customary, however, we accept full responsibility for any remaining errors.

ABSTRACT

American League batters have been hit by pitches 10% to 15% more frequently than National League batters since the designated hitter rule was introduced in 1973. This evidence is consistent with the idea that the American League s adoption of the designated hitter rule created a classic moral hazard problem. Because they are not required to appear at the plate, American League pitchers can throw at opposing hitters with greater impunity (i.e., at lower cost) than National League pitchers who must take their turns at bat and, hence, bear more of the costs of their own actions. (JEL D81, J28)

DIGITAL OBJECT IDENTIFIER (DOI)

10.1111/j.1465-7295.1997.tb02032.x About DOI