Why Do Increased Arrest Rates Appear to Reduce Crime: Deterrence, Incapacitation, or Measurement Error?

Steven Levitt ()

No 5268, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: A strong, negative empirical correlation exists between arrest rates and reported crime rates. While this relationship has often been interpreted as support for the deterrence hypothesis, it is equally consistent with incapacitation effects, and/or a spurious correlation that would be induced by measurement error in reported crime rates. This paper attempts to discriminate between deterrence, incapacitation, and measurement error as explanations for the empirical relationship between arrest rates and crime. Using a modified version of the techniques of Griliches and Hausman (1986) for dealing with measurement error in panel data, this paper first demonstrates that the presence of measurement error does not appear to explain the observed relationship between arrest rates and crime rates. To differentiate between deterrence and incapacitation, the impact of changes in the arrest rate for one crime on the rate of other crimes is examined. In contrast to the effect of increased arrests for one crime on the commission of that crime, where deterrence and incapacitation are indistinguishable, it is demonstrated that these two forces act in opposite directions when looking across crimes. Incapacitation suggests that an increase in the arrest rate for one crime will reduce all crime rates; deterrence predicts that an increase in the arrest rate for one crime will lead to a rise in other crimes as criminals substitute away from the first crime. Empirically, deterrence appears to be the more important factor, particularly for property crimes.

JEL-codes: K42 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: Written
Note: PE
View list of references View citations in EconPapers

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.nber.org/papers/w5268.pdf (application/pdf)
Access to the full text is generally limited to series subscribers, however if the top level domain of the client browser is in a developing country or transition economy free access is provided. More information about subscriptions and free access is available at http://www.nber.org/wwphelp.html.

Related works:
Journal Article: Why Do Increased Arrest Rates Appear to Reduce Crime: Deterrence, Incapacitation, or Measurement Error? (1998)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nbr:nberwo:5268

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.nber.org/papers/w5268
The price is Paper copy available by mail.

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc
Address: National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.
Contact information at EDIRC.
Series data maintained by ().