The Impact of Macroeconomic Conditions on Property Crime

John Nunley (), Richard Seals () and Joachim Zietz

No auwp2011-06, Auburn Economics Working Paper Series from Department of Economics, Auburn University

Abstract: This paper examines the impact of inflation, (un)employment, and stock market growth on the rates of larceny, burglary, motor vehicle theft, and robbery. The study uses U.S. data for the time period 1948 to 2009. We employ an unobserved component approach to circumvent the problems associated with omitted variables. We find that the three macroeconomic variables have a statistically significant impact for most of the property crime rates. However, taken together the macroeconomic variables explain no more than 15 percent of the surge in property crimes from the 1960 to the 1980s and their subsequent fall during the 1990s. Among the macroeconomic variables, almost all of the explanatory power is provided by changes in the inflation rate.

Keywords: Murder Rate; Demographic Change; Age Composition; Crime; Misery Index (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J10 J11 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dem and nep-law
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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