The Effect of Undocumented Immigration and Border Enforcement on Crime Rates along the U.S.-Mexico Border

Roberto Coronado and Pia Orrenius

No 303, Working Papers from Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Abstract: In the 1990s, the U.S. border led the nation in the decline of property-related crimes, while violent crime rates fell twice as fast in the U.S. as in the median border county. This paper asks how changes in undocumented immigration and border enforcement have played a role in generating these divergent trends. We find that while migrant apprehensions are correlated with a greater incidence of violent crime, they are not systematically associated with higher rates of property crime. Border patrol enforcement is associated with lower property crime rates but higher violent crime. Interestingly, it is local enforcement (same or neighboring sector) that is correlated with higher violent crime. Higher border enforcement overall is correlated with less violent crime. Several trends likely underlie these results. First, more enforcement in urban versus rural areas has pushed property crime rates down by keeping migrants and smugglers away from densely populated areas. Second, it is likely that more enforcement (and other factors) have led to an increased use of professional smugglers which in turn has led to more violence on the border.

Keywords: crime; immigration policy; undocumented immigration (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J61 K42 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 33 pages
Date: 2003
Note: Published as: Coronado, Roberto and Pia M. Orrenius (2007), " The Effect of Undocumented Immigration and Border Enforcement on Crime Rates along the U.S.-Mexico Border," Migraciones Internacionales 4 (1): 39-64.
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.dallasfed.org/~/media/documents/research/papers/2003/wp0303.pdf Full text (application/pdf)

Related works:
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: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:fip:feddwp:03-03

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Amy Chapman ().