Crime, deterrence and punishment revisited
Open accessAbstract
Despite an abundance of empirical evidence on crime spanning over 40 years, there exists no consensus on the impact of the criminal justice system on crime activity. We construct a new panel data set that contains all relevant variables prescribed by economic theory. Our identification strategy allows for a feedback relationship between crime and deterrence variables, and it controls for omitted variables and measurement error. We deviate from the majority of the literature in that we specify a dynamic model, which captures the essential feature of habit formation and persistence in aggregate behaviour. Our results show that the criminal justice system exerts a large influence on crime activity. Increasing the risk of apprehension and conviction is more influential in reducing crime than raising the expected severity of punishment.
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Estimating long-run relationships from dynamic heterogeneous panels
Pesaran, M. H., & Smith, R. (1995) · Journal of Econometrics · doi:10.1016/0304-4076(94)01644-f · Cited by 5,479 · see citing works
Merton, R. K. (2017) · Gangs · doi:10.4324/9781351157803-1 · Cited by 3,689 · see citing works
The Deterrent Effect of Imprisonment
Durlauf, S. N., & Nagin, D. S. (2011) · Controlling Crime · doi:10.7208/chicago/9780226115139.003.0002 · Cited by 101 · see citing works
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BLACK LIVES MATTER PROTESTS, FATAL POLICE INTERACTIONS, AND CRIME
Skoy, E. (2021) · Contemporary Economic Policy · doi:10.1111/coep.12508 · Cited by 42 · see citing works
- Authors
- Bun, M. J. G., Kelaher, R., Sarafidis, V., & Weatherburn, D.
- Affiliations
- University of Amsterdam (NL)
- The University of Sydney (AU)
- Monash University (AU)
- Government of New South Wales (AU)
- Corresponding author
- Bun, Maurice J. G.
- Sarafidis, Vasilis
- Venue
- Empirical Economics
- Published
- 2019-09-10
- Volume
- 59
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 2303-2333
- ISSN
- 0377-7332 (ISSN-L)
- 1435-8921
- OpenAlex
- W2346611374
- Cited by
- 81
- References
- 3
- Citations by year
- 2026: 8 · 2025: 11 · 2024: 11 · 2023: 11 · 2022: 30 · 2021: 6 · 2020: 3 · 2016: 1
- FWCI
- 12.18
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Empirical Economics (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- UNSWorks (University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia) (submittedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Monash University Research Portal (Monash University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Brunel University Research Archive (BURA) (Brunel University London) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- University of Amsterdam
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Law, Economics, and Judicial Systems
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Crime Patterns and Interventions
- Social Sciences › Law › Criminal Justice and Penology
- Keywords
- crime, deterrence, punishment, criminal justice system, apprehension, criminal conviction, severity of punishment, habit formation, dynamic panel data, feedback effects
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