Homelessness and Crime: An Examination of California

Benjamin Artz () and David M. Welsch
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Benjamin Artz: University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh
David M. Welsch: University of Wisconsin. Whitewater

No 17086, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: We employ a unique 10-year panel dataset from California to examine both the effect crime has on homelessness as well as the effect homelessness has on crime. Our main estimator accounts for endogeneity by incorporating dynamics, controlling for time invariant unobserved heterogeneity, and relaxing the strict exogeneity assumption for our key variables of interest. We find strong evidence that regions experiencing increases in property crime, but not violent crime, should expect a practically significant increase in homelessness, whereas increases in homelessness increases the number of violent crimes, but not property crimes. Robustness and falsification checks confirm the results.

Keywords: homeless; crime; instrumental variables (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C23 K14 R20 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 49 pages
Date: 2024-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-law and nep-ure
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