Does Capital Punishment have a "Local" Deterrent Effect on Homicides?

Randi Hjalmarsson

American Law and Economics Review, 2008, vol. 11, issue 2, 310-334

Abstract: The vast majority of death penalty studies use geographically or temporally aggregated data. Such aggregation can make it virtually impossible to identify small amounts of variation in homicides due to executions. Therefore, this study uses data that are disaggregated down to daily and city levels to test whether executions have a short-term deterrent effect. Little consistent evidence is found that Texas executions deter Dallas, San Antonio, and Houston homicides from 1999 to 2004. The analysis also does not consistently support the hypotheses that the deterrent effect should be more evident for local executions or executions that received local media coverage. Copyright 2008, Oxford University Press.

Date: 2008
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