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Crime and Police Resources: The Street Crime Initiative

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Author Info
Machin, Steve
Marie, Olivier

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Abstract

In this paper we look at links between police resources and crime in a different way to the existing economics of crime work. To do so we focus on a large-scale policy intervention - the Street Crime Initiative - that was introduced in England and Wales in 2002. This allocated additional resources to some police force areas to combat street crime, whereas other forces did not receive any additional funding. Estimates derived from several empirical strategies show that robberies fell significantly in SCI police forces relative to non-SCI forces after the initiative was introduced. Moreover, the policy seems to have been a cost effective one, even after allowing for possible displacement or diffusion effects onto other crimes and adjacent areas. There is some heterogeneity in this positive net social benefit across different SCI police forces, suggesting that some police forces may have made better use of the extra resources than others. Overall, we reach the conclusion that increased police resources do in fact lead to lower crime, at least in the context of the SCI programme we study.

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Paper provided by C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers in its series CEPR Discussion Papers with number 5390.

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Date of creation: Nov 2005
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Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:5390

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Related research
Keywords: cost effectiveness; police resources; street crime;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
H00 - Public Economics - - General - - - General
H5 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies
K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Levitt, Steven D, 1997. "Using Electoral Cycles in Police Hiring to Estimate the Effect of Police on Crime," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(3), pages 270-90, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  2. Steven D. Levitt, 2002. "Using Electoral Cycles in Police Hiring to Estimate the Effects of Police on Crime: Reply," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(4), pages 1244-1250, September. [Downloadable!]
  3. Ashenfelter, Orley C, 1978. "Estimating the Effect of Training Programs on Earnings," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 60(1), pages 47-57, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Justin McCrary, 2002. "Using Electoral Cycles in Police Hiring to Estimate the Effect of Police on Crime: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(4), pages 1236-1243, September. [Downloadable!]
  5. Heckman, James J & Ichimura, Hidehiko & Todd, Petra, 1998. "Matching as an Econometric Evaluation Estimator," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 65(2), pages 261-94, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Ashenfelter, Orley & Card, David, 1985. "Using the Longitudinal Structure of Earnings to Estimate the Effect of Training Programs," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 67(4), pages 648-60, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Draca, Mirko & Machin, Stephen & Witt, Robert, 2008. "Panic on the Streets of London: Police, Crime and the July 2005 Terror Attacks," IZA Discussion Papers 3410, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  2. John Smith & Olugbenga Ajilore, 2007. "Ethnic Fragmentation and Police Spending: Social Identity and a Public Good," Departmental Working Papers 200708, Rutgers University, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  3. Philip J. Cook, 2008. "Assessing Urban Crime And Its Control: An Overview," NBER Working Papers 13781, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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