Prices, policing and policy: the dynamics of crime booms and busts

Tom Kirchmaier (), Stephen Machin, Matteo Sandi and Robert Witt

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: In many historical episodes, criminal activity displays booms and busts. One clear example is the case of metal crime in the United Kingdom (and elsewhere) where, in the face of big increases in value driven by world commodity prices, thefts rose very sharply in the 2000s, after which they fell. This paper studies the respective roles of prices, policing and policy in shaping this crime boom and bust. Separate study of each reveals metal crime being driven up via sizeable and significant metal crime-price elasticities and driven down by changes in policing and policy. A regression-based decomposition analysis confirms that all three of the hypothesised factors considered in the paper-prices, policing and policy-were empirically important in the different stages of metal theft's boom and bust.

Keywords: metal crime; metal prices; commodity prices (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: K42 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 38 pages
Date: 2020-04-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-law
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Published in Journal of the European Economic Association, 1, April, 2020, 18(2), pp. 1040 - 1077. ISSN: 1542-4766

Downloads: (external link)
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/101677/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Prices, Policing and Policy: The Dynamics of Crime Booms and Busts (2020)
Working Paper: Prices, policing and policy: the dynamics of crime booms and busts (2018)
Working Paper: Prices, policing and policy: the dynamics of crime booms and busts (2018)
Working Paper: Prices, Policing and Policy: The Dynamics of Crime Booms and Busts (2018)
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:ehl:lserod:101677

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library LSE Library Portugal Street London, WC2A 2HD, U.K.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by LSERO Manager ().