This paper examines the role of repetition in government regulation using Florida restaurant inspection data from 2003 to 2010. In the raw data, inspectors new to inspected restaurants tend to report 27 percent more violations than repeat inspectors. After ruling out regulatory capture and endogenous rotation of inspectors as potential explanations, we find that the gap between new and repeat inspections is best explained by the following two effects: first, restaurants target compliance in response to the heterogeneous stringency and preferences of inspectors; second, inspectors pay greater attention in a first visit than in subsequent visits. After controlling for the heterogeneous criteria of inspectors, we find that a new inspector reports 13–18 percent more violations than noted in the second visit of the previous inspector, likely because of a higher level of attention. Counterfactual simulations highlight the importance of inspectors’ training and rotation in regulatory outcomes.

中文翻译：

---

重复的故事：佛罗里达餐馆检查的教训

本文使用2003年至2010年的佛罗里达餐馆检查数据来检验重复在政府监管中的作用。在原始数据中，刚到被检查餐馆的检查员所报告的违规行为比重复检查员多27％。在排除了监管捕获和检查员的内在轮换作为可能的解释之后，我们发现新检查和重复检查之间的差距可以通过以下两个效果得到最好的解释：第一，饭店针对检查员的异类严格性和偏好来达到合规性；其次，检查人员在第一次访问中要比在随后的访问中更加关注。在控制了检查员的不同标准之后，我们发现新检查员报告的违规行为比前一个检查员第二次访问所记录的多13％至18％，可能是由于更高的关注度。反事实模拟强调了检查员的培训和轮换对监管结果的重要性。