The impact of natural disasters on crime

Susmita Roy ()
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Susmita Roy: University of Canterbury, https://www.canterbury.ac.nz

Working Papers in Economics from University of Canterbury, Department of Economics and Finance

Abstract: This study addresses the following questions in the context of a developing coun- try. Do crimes increase following natural disasters? Does an upcoming election or the presence of a strong local media, which potentially increases the incentive of the gov- ernment to provide disaster relief, mitigate the e ect of disasters on crime rates? I nd that crime rates tend to increase following moderate to big disasters. Furthermore, a higher pre-disaster growth of newspapers has a mitigating e ect on the crime response to disasters. Elections also in uence the crime response to disasters. Crimes are more likely to rise following disasters in the years that are close to an election year.

Keywords: crime rate; natural disaster; role of media and elections; developing country (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: K42 Q54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 33 pages
Date: 2010-09-14
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dev, nep-ene and nep-law
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cbt:econwp:10/57

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