Philip J. Cook, ITT/Terry Sanford Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Public Policy Studies

Philip J. Cook

Philip J. Cook is ITT/Sanford Professor Emeritus of Public Policy and Professor Emeritus of Economics  at Duke University. He served as director and chair of Duke’s Sanford Institute of Public Policy from 1985-89, and again from 1997-99. Cook is an honorary Fellow in the American Society of Criminology. In 2001 he was elected to membership in the National Academy of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

Cook joined the Duke faculty in 1973 after earning his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. He has served as consultant to the U.S. Department of Justice (Criminal Division) and to the U.S. Department of Treasury (Enforcement Division). He has served in a variety of capacities with the National Academy of Sciences, including membership on expert panels dealing with alcohol-abuse prevention, violence, school shootings, underage drinking, the deterrent effect of the death penalty, and proactive policing. He served as vice chair of the National Research Council’s Committee on Law and Justice.

Cook's primary focus at the moment is the economics of crime. He is co-director of the NBER Work Group on the Economics of Crime, and co-editor of a NBER volume on crime prevention.  He also has ongoing projects on education policy and academic performance, with recent publications on starting age for public schools, and on how lead exposure affects academic performance and delinquency.

Over much of his career, one strand of Cook’s research concerns the prevention of alcohol-related problems through restrictions on alcohol availability. An early article was the first to demonstrate persuasively that alcohol taxes have a direct effect on the death rate of heavy drinkers, and subsequent research demonstrated the moderate efficacy of minimum-purchase-age laws in preventing fatal crashes. Together with Michael J. Moore, he focused on the effects of beer taxes on youthful drinking and the consequences thereof, finding that more restrictive policies result in lower rates of abuse, higher college graduation rates and lower crime rates. His book on the subject is Paying the Tab: The Costs and Benefits of Alcohol Control, (Princeton University Press, 2007; 2016 in paper).

A second strand has concerned the costs and consequences of the widespread availability of guns, and what might be done about it. His book (with Jens Ludwig), Gun Violence: The Real Costs (Oxford University Press, 2000), develops and applies a framework for assessing costs that is grounded in economic theory and is quite at odds with the traditional “Cost of Injury” framework. His book with Kristin A. Goss, The Gun Debate (Oxford University Press 2014, 2020) is intended for a general audience seeking an objective assessment of the myriad relevant issues.  He is currently heading up an evaluation of the Chicago Police Department's Area Technology Centers, together with a team from the University of Chicago Crime Lab.  

Cook has also co-authored two other books: with Charles Clotfelter on state lotteries (Selling Hope: State Lotteries in America, Harvard University Press, 1989), and with Robert H. Frank on the causes and consequences of the growing inequality of earnings (The Winner-Take-All Society, The Free Press, 1995). The Winner-Take-All Society was named a “Notable Book of the Year, 1995” by the New York Times Book Review.  It has been translated into Japanese, Chinese, Portuguese, Polish, and Korean.

Office Location:  Sanford School of Public Policy, Box 90245, Durham, NC 27708
Office Phone:  +1 919 260 4338
Email Address: send me a message
Web Page:  https://duke.box.com/shared/static/58kkdbhukdu1rfgrh1mgof583cr9yzih.doc

Education:

Ph.D.University of California, Berkeley1973
BA (with high distinction)University of Michigan1968
Specialties:

Public Economics
Research Interests:

One strand of Dr. Cook's research addresses the prevention of alcohol-related problems through restrictions on alcohol availability. A second strand concerns the economics of crime, with focus on violence. His recent books (with Jens Ludwig) include Gun Violence: The Real Costs (Oxford University Press, 2000), which develops and applies a framework for assessing costs that is grounded in economic theory and is quite at odds with the traditional "COI" framework; and Evaluating Gun Policy (Brookings Institution Press, 2003), an edited collection of original contributions. Dr. Cook has also written on the state lotteries with Charles Clotfelter (Selling Hope: State Lotteries in America, Harvard University Press, 1989), and with Robert H. Frank on the causes and consequences of the growing inequality of earnings (The Winner-Take-All Society, The Free Press, 1995).

Keywords:

Abortion • Abortion, Legal • Adolescent • Adolescent Behavior • Adult • African Americans • Alcohol Drinking • Alcohol-Related Disorders • Alcoholic Beverages • Alcoholism • Birth Rate • Burglary • Burglary protection • Case-Control Studies • Child • Child, Unwanted • Choice (Psychology) • Commerce • Cost Savings • Cost-Benefit Analysis • Costs and Cost Analysis • Crime • Crime prevention • Criminal behavior • Criminal Law • Data Collection • Drug and Narcotic Control • Educational Status • Efficiency • Emergency Medical Services • Emergency Service, Hospital • Female • Financing, Government • Gambling • Gun control • Harm Reduction • Health Behavior • Health Care Costs • Health Policy • Hispanic Americans • History • Homicide • Hospital Costs • Hospitalization • Humans • Illinois • Incidence • Infant • Juvenile courts • Law Enforcement • Longitudinal Studies • Lotteries • Medical Indigency • Middle Aged • Models, Statistical • Motivation • North Carolina • Poverty • Pregnancy • Pregnancy Outcome • Probability • Public Health • Public Policy • Quality of Life • Research Design • Robbery • Schools • Self-defense • Social Control Policies • Socioeconomic Factors • Taxes • Teacher turnover • United States • Violence • Wounds and Injuries • Wounds, Gunshot • Young Adult

Current Ph.D. Students  

Representative Publications

  1. Cook, PJ; Donohue, JJ, Saving lives by regulating guns: Evidence for policy, Science, vol. 358 no. 6368 (December, 2017), pp. 1259 [doi]
  2. Braga AA, ; Cook PJ, , The association of firearm caliber with likelihood of death from gunshot injury in criminal assaults, JAMA Network Open, vol. 1 no. 3 (July, 2018), pp. e180833 [2688536], [doi]  [abs]
  3. Cook, PJ; Ludwig, J, The social costs of gun ownership: a reply to Hayo, Neumeier, and Westphal, Empirical Economics, vol. 56 no. 1 (January, 2019), pp. 13-22, Springer Nature [doi]  [abs]
  4. Smucker, S; Kerber, RE; Cook, PJ, Suicide and Additional Homicides Associated with Intimate Partner Homicide: North Carolina 2004-2013., Journal of urban health : bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine, vol. 95 no. 3 (June, 2018), pp. 337-343 [doi]  [abs]
  5. Cook, PJ, Challenge of Firearms Control in a Free Society, Criminology and Public Policy, vol. 17 no. 2 (May, 2018), pp. 437-451 [doi]  [abs]
  6. Cook, PJ, Gun Theft and Crime., Journal of urban health : bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine, vol. 95 no. 3 (June, 2018), pp. 305-312 [doi]  [abs]