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Does Public Spending on Youths Affect Crime Rates?

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  • Lindvall, Lars

    (Department of Economics)

Abstract

Two important determinants of crime rates in economic theories of crime are deterrent effects and legal income opportunities. For at least two reasons, youth crimes do not fit into this picture since: 1) most youths do not work 2) deterrent effects, in terms of punishment, are non existent or reduced for youths. Understanding the processes behind youth crimes is important for the reduction of crime both in the short and the long run. This paper explores the role of public spending on youths and crime rates. Using a panel of 261 Swedish municipalities the effects on four crime rates of leisure related municipality expenditure and municipality expenditure on upper secondary school are explored using non-linear fixed effect models. The main findings of the paper are: 1) there exists statistically significant effects of the two types of spending on crime rates 2) there is a trade off between fighting different crimes, i.e. spending that reduces one type of crime might increase another type 3) the effects differ, both in direction and magnitude, between different types of municipalities, e.g. rural vs. urban 4) the effects are not constant, but rather increasing/decreasing in spending level.

Suggested Citation

  • Lindvall, Lars, 2003. "Does Public Spending on Youths Affect Crime Rates?," Working Paper Series 2004:3, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:uunewp:2004_003
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    Cited by:

    1. Österholm, Pär, 2004. "Estimating the Relationship between Age Structure and GDP in the OECD Using Panel Cointegration Methods," Working Paper Series 2004:13, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    2. Thomas Aronsson & Sören Blomquist, 2008. "Redistribution and Provision of Public Goods in an Economic Federation," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 10(1), pages 125-143, February.
    3. Sören Blomquist & Vidar Christiansen, 2008. "Taxation and Heterogeneous Preferences," FinanzArchiv: Public Finance Analysis, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 64(2), pages 218-244, June.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Youth crime; public sepnding; leisure; school;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H39 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Other
    • K49 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Other

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