An ounce of prevention, a pound of cure: The effects of college expansions on crime

In this paper, we argue that the availability of colleges incentivizes college enrollment and, by increasing the opportunity cost of incarceration, it has the potential to reduce crime. We provide empirical evidence from college expansions in the US over the years 1974–2019 and implement a triple-difference identification strategy to compare the arrest rates of different age groups over time in counties that differ by their college expansions. The reduced-form results suggest significant reductions in arrest rates. The effects hold across main categories of crime and over a variety of specifications and a wide array of robustness checks. We utilize an event-study analysis and a series of placebo tests to rule out the problems of pre-trend and endogenous migration. We discuss the policy implications and potential social savings of college opening through reductions in crime.