Unemployment and gang crime: can prosperity backfire?

In this paper, we study how unemployment affects gang crime. We examine a model of criminal gangs and suggest that a substitution effect between petty crime and severe crime is at work. In the model, non-monetary valuation of gang membership is private knowledge. Thus, the leaders face a trade-off between less crime per member in large gangs and more crime per member in small gangs. A decrease in unemployment may result in a switch from a large gang that requires petty crime to a small gang that requires severe crime.     

论网络犯罪及其防治对策

网络犯罪是现代社会的一种新型犯罪,它包括以网络为对象的犯罪和以网络为犯罪现场的犯罪。它具有技术含量高、危害程度重、涉及面广、隐蔽性强等特征。因此,打击该种犯罪,要完善法律法规,加强网络犯罪立法的国际协调与合作。     

Panel data estimates of the effects of different types of crime on housing prices

One of the most studied effects of crime is the impact that neighborhood crime has on housing values. A major drawback of these studies is that, although crime is undoubtedly endogenous in property value models because of either simultaneity, omitted variables or measurement error, the vast majority of studies treat crime measures as exogenous independent variables. We exploit a unique nine-year crime panel at the neighborhood level to estimate models that properly address the endogeneity of crime and allow us to overcome other specification errors that have plagued previous studies. Of the seven different types of crime we investigate, only robbery and aggravated assault crimes (per acre) exert a meaningful influence upon neighborhood housing values.     

Identifying crime generators and spatially overlapping high-risk areas through a nonlinear model: A comparison between three cities of the Valencian region (Spain)

The behavior and spatial distribution of crime events can be explained through the characterization of an area in terms of its demography, socioeconomy, and built environment. In particular, recent studies on the incidence of crime in a city have focused on the identification of features of the built environment (specific places or facilities) that may increase crime risk within a certain radius. However, it is hard to identify environmental characteristics that consistently explain crime occurrence across cities and crime types. This article focuses on the assessment of the effect that certain types of places have on the incidence of property crime, robbery, and vandalism in three cities of the Valencian region (Spain): Alicante, Castellon, and Valencia. A nonlinear effects model is used to identify such places and to construct a risk map over the three cities considering the three crime types under research. The results obtained suggest that there are remarkable differences across cities and crime types in terms of the types of places associated with crime outcomes. The identification of high-risk areas allows verifying that crime is highly concentrated, and also that there is a high level of spatial overlap between the high-risk areas corresponding to different crime types.     

Is There a Natural Rate of Crime?

Studies in the economics of crime literature have reached mixed conclusions on the deterrence hypothesis. One explanation that has been offered for the failure to find evidence of a deterrent effect in the long run is the natural rate of crime. This article applies univariate unit root tests to crime series for the United Kingdom and United States and panel unit roots to crime rates for a panel of G7 countries to examine whether there is a natural rate of crime. Our main finding is that when we allow for two structural breaks in the univariate unit root test and a structural break in the panel data unit root test, there is strong evidence of a natural rate of crime. The policy implications of our findings is that governments should focus on altering the economic and social structural profile that determines crime in the long run rather than increasing expenditure on law enforcement that will at best reduce crime rates in the short run.     

青少年犯罪的物质与心理原因——基于阿德勒“自卑”与“补偿”的视角

青少年犯罪已成为困扰当今世界各国的一个严重社会问题,团伙犯罪是其突出特点。从心理学家阿德勒"自卑感"与"补偿"理论出发,拓展出对青少年团伙犯罪研究的新视角,同时对冀东地区团伙犯罪青少年进行了抽样调查,将理论探讨与实证研究相结合,分析了青少年团伙犯罪的心理原因,即自卑感的来源和过度补偿的表现方式,并引申出对于预防青少年犯罪的两点建议。     

Marked point process hotspot maps for homicide and gun crime prediction in Chicago

Crime hotspot maps are a widely used and successful method of displaying spatial crime patterns and allocating police resources. However, hotspot maps are often created over a single timescale using only one crime type. In the case of short-term hotspot maps that utilize several weeks of crime data, risk estimates suffer from a high variance, especially for low frequency crimes such as homicide. Long-term hotspot maps that utilize several years of data fail to take into account near-repeat effects and emerging hotspot trends. In this paper we show how point process models of crime can be extended to include leading indicator crime types, while capturing both short-term and long-term patterns of risk, through a marked point process approach. Several years of data and many different crime types are systematically combined to yield accurate hotspot maps that can be used for the purpose of predictive policing of gun-related crime. We apply the methodology to a large, open source data set which has been made available to the general public online by the Chicago Police Department.     

Blowing it up and knocking it down: The local and city-wide effects of demolishing high concentration public housing on crime

This paper estimates the effect that the closure and demolition of roughly 20,000 units of geographically concentrated high-rise public housing had on crime in Chicago. We estimate local effects of closures on crime in the neighborhoods where high-rises stood and in proximate neighborhoods. We also estimate the impact that households displaced from high-rises had on crime in the neighborhoods to which they moved and neighborhoods close to those. Overall, reductions in violent crime in and near the areas where high-rises were demolished greatly outweighed increases in violent crime associated with the arrival of displaced residents in new neighborhoods.     

Foreclosure,vacancy and crime

This paper examines the impact of residential foreclosures and vacancies on violent and property crime. To overcome confounding factors, a difference-in-difference research design is applied to a unique data set containing geocoded foreclosure and crime data from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Results indicate that while foreclosure alone has no effect on crime, violent crime rates increase by roughly 19% once the foreclosed home becomes vacant – an effect that increases with length of vacancy. We find weak evidence suggesting a potential vacancy effect for property crime that is much lower in magnitude.     

After the economic crisis of 2008: Economic conditions and crime in the last decade for the case of Spain

The economic approach to crime confirms that the deterioration of economic conditions influences the motivation of potential offenders to commit a crime or not. The relationship between crime and the economy status received considerable attention among the international literature. However, in Spain, there are just few studies that analyse this connection, and those that analyse the influence of the deterioration of the economy on crime after the crisis that began in 2008 are practically non-existent. In order to fill this gap, this research applies the difference-GMM estimator for a sample of 47 provinces during the 2010–2018 period and controls the influence of different economic, demographic and dissuasive factors on the crime rate. The results obtained are similar to those of different investigations, since in the face of worsening economic conditions, no evidence of a positive and uniform effect on the crime rate is detected, especially when it differs according to different types of crimes possible. However, that relationship does exist and is robust in property crimes. Another common result in the empirical literature is also confirmed: adolescent male cohorts present the highest crime rates.     

Organized crime and public spending: a panel data analysis

The aim of this paper is to investigate, empirically, what components of public spending imply a decreasing effect on organized crime and what components create opportunities for organized crime, discussing also the role of government efficiency. Using a panel data analysis, the results show a strikingly consistent pattern for the EU Member States. Organized crime mainly operates in the distribution of government spending for local public goods and public provision of private services. There is a decreasing effect on organized crime of the public expenditure devoted to education and social policy. Government efficiency in public spending is beneficial to limit the opportunities of the organized crime.     

The deterrent impact of police: An examination of a locally provided public service

This paper develops and empirically tests a model of crime deterrence in an urban area. There are two important departures from past efforts to study the impact of criminal sanctions. The first is that the provision of sanctions from the local public sector is modeled; this is accomplished by specifying the distributional goals of local government and by specifying the production of safety. The second departure is that actual crime and reported crime are differentiated theoretically and in the empirical work. An empirical test of the model, using a unique neighborhood data set, shows that police deter crime significantly; however, this deterrent impact cannot be demonstrated without the distinction between actual and reported crime.     

Stability of a crime level equilibrium

We consider crime level in an economic market with a supply of potential criminals. These criminals differ in their opportunity cost for committing crime, reflecting differences in the value of foregone opportunities such as performing productive labor. The realized demand is influenced by the expected value for crime, which depends on several socio-economic variables including wealth, police enforcement, and police arrest ability. After determining the equilibria level suggested by our approach, we propose a dynamic setup and study the stability of this system. Two critical enforcement levels are determined. Exceeding the lower enforcement threshold will push crime to stabilize (converge) to an equilibrium level. Correspondingly, exceeding the higher enforcement threshold will collapse the crime market to zero.     

计算机犯罪的特征及其对策探析

计算机犯罪是高科技发展的附属产品,对社会危害日趋严重。文章分析了计算机犯罪的主要特征,然后从技术、管理、法制3个方面提出了预防和打击计算机犯罪的措施。     

New evidence on the origins of corporate crime

The intuition that poorly performing corporations are more likely to engage in crime is found throughout the contemporary literature on the economics and law and economics of corporate misconduct. Yet little evidence of such a relationship exists. This paper presents new evidence on the relationship between prior performance and corporate crime, using panel data on public corporations, 1975–92. When prior performance is measured in terms of earnings, only very weak evidence of a relationship is found. However, we find that a low rate of sales or employment growth by the firm tends to be a good predictor of environmental crime, and that environmental crime tends to occur in industries that have had relatively high rates of growth, as measured by employment or sales. This suggests that it is the performance of the firm rather than or relative to that of the industry that matters. Support for this finding is robust. The data provide weaker support for the notion that prior performance affects the occurrence of other types of corporate crime, particularly fraud. This may reflect the presence of mechanisms through which potential fraud victims, unlike potential environmental crime victims, can and do respond to events that would increase their chances of becoming crime victims by taking steps to prevent it. Finally, larger firms are found significantly more likely to have engaged in crime than smaller firms, in contrast to recent suggestions in the literature.     

The market for street crime: An economic analysis of victim-offender interaction

This paper views the economic explanation of crime rates from a new perspective by explicitly deriving an economic model of the behavior of potential victims and considering the interaction of the behavior of potential victims with the behavior of offenders. Crime is produced through offenders supplying time in search of victims and victims demanding to expose themselves to the environment. A model is set up in which the crime rate, the probability of being a victim per unit of exposure time, and the probability of finding a victim per unit of offenders' search time are simultaneously determined. The model leads us to distinguish the “real” crime rate (the probability of being a victim per unit of exposure time) from the “nominal” crime rate (the number of crimes per capita). The nominal crime rate can be inversely related to the real crime rate.     

Immigration,socio-economic conditions and crime: a cross-sectional versus cross-sectional time-series perspective

This study purpose is to verify if there is an association between foreign immigration and crime. In doing this, the study investigates also some satellite aspects revolving around this possible association: the range of offences affected by immigration, the relationship between immigrant and native crime, and whether the immigration impact on crime is direct or indirect. The present study has addressed these issues by both a cross-sectional and a longitudinal analysis, the latter including an instrument. The study is based on data of the Italian provinces. Italy represents a critical case for studying the migration–crime relationship, because in this country the rise in foreign immigration has been sudden and its pace feverish. The cross-sectional analysis findings show that crime intensities are affected by time-invariant factors and marginally by immigration. On the contrary, the longitudinal analysis shows that variations in immigration had a positive impact on both the most serious and the most common offences, on property crimes as well as on crimes of violence. There is no evidence of indirect effects of immigration on crime or of a link with native crime. In contrast to previous literature regarding the U.S., Canada, and Australia, these results suggest that a spiralling immigration can affect crime. In terms of methods, these findings show that the standard synchronic analysis models can be biased by non-observed factors and that therefore cross-sectional time-series models can offer significant advantages.     

金融系统职务犯罪预防探讨

目前,随着我国金融业的不断发展壮大,金融界的职务犯罪案件越来越频繁。本文深入剖析了当前金融系统职务犯罪的特点和主要成因,提出了预防金融系统职务犯罪的一些有针对性的对策措施。     

论当代刑事政策中价值选择及方法论

现代刑事政策的发展是和人们对于犯罪及刑罚认识的不断深化密切相关,将犯罪放在社会的角度,不但构成了预防的长链条,使刑罚不再成为解决犯罪的唯一解药;同时,刑罚的施用也不再是对犯罪处理的结束,对犯罪行为矫正的链条也应当在社会生活的背景下继续延长,形成对犯罪行为更为深刻和持久性的影响。与此相关,在当代刑事政策的采纳运用中,刑罚个别化作为其方法论选择,则成为不可忽视的其中一环。     

The Effects of Criminal Experience on the Incidence of Crime

A bstract . A hypothesis has been analyzed that criminals learn by doing, that with experience criminals increase their activity so that with level outlays on police the incidence of crime may be increasing. This hypothesis is tested by statistical analysis of time series cross sectional data on crime levels, police outlays and various socioeconomic variables. The results confirm that "learning by doing"—accumulating criminal experience—increases criminal activity, that police outlays have a negative and significant effect on crime and that certain socioeconomic characteristics have a significant effect on crime.