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How effective are Governor's party affiliated campaign promises on crime? Evidence from U.S. states

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  • Joshi, Swarup

Abstract

Criminal justice policies are contested issues during gubernatorial campaigns, with Republicans advocating for tough policies, and Democrats for reforms. The controversy is exacerbated by lack of research on what actually works. Policies and rhetoric used by candidates could impact voter's decision and real world outcomes. In this paper, I use Regression Discontinuity Design framework to investigate the causal impact of party affiliation on crime, with affiliation serving as a proxy for policies. Although past research has shown some success of party affiliated campaign promises (education spending, labor market, etc.), I fail to find evidence of impact on crime rates in the short run. For potential mechanism, I find that governors do not impact criminal justice policy metrics. Thus, given the controversial nature of crime, it is difficult to deliver drastic changes, as such the effectiveness of crime related campaign promises in the short run is unreliable.

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  • Joshi, Swarup, 2022. "How effective are Governor's party affiliated campaign promises on crime? Evidence from U.S. states," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecmode:v:113:y:2022:i:c:s0264999322001225
    DOI: 10.1016/j.econmod.2022.105876
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Politics; Crime; Regression discontinuity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • K10 - Law and Economics - - Basic Areas of Law - - - General (Constitutional Law)
    • K11 - Law and Economics - - Basic Areas of Law - - - Property Law
    • K14 - Law and Economics - - Basic Areas of Law - - - Criminal Law

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