Title

Unobserved heterogeneity bias when estimating the economic model of crime

Authors

Authors

T. L. Cherry

Comments

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Abbreviated Journal Title

Appl. Econ. Lett.

Keywords

Economics

Abstract

Using unique and unpublished panel data from selected US cities, the paper investigates the consequences of ignoring unobserved heterogeneity in the unit of observation when estimating the economic model of crime. Results confirm that neglecting to control for unobserved heterogeneity overstates the ability of sanctions to deter criminal activity. Further, this upward bias is found to vary significantly across crime types. Interestingly, heterogeneity is insignificant in the tightly reported crimes of murder and auto-theft while being significant in assault, robbery, burglary and larceny where individuals and police have greater discretion in reporting.

Journal Title

Applied Economics Letters

Volume

6

Issue/Number

11

Publication Date

1-1-1999

Document Type

Article

DOI Link

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/135048599352349

Language

English

First Page

753

Last Page

757

WOS Identifier

WOS:000084087700010

ISSN

1350-4851

Recommended Citation

"Unobserved heterogeneity bias when estimating the economic model of crime" (1999). Faculty Bibliography 1990s. 2582.
https://stars.library.ucf.edu/facultybib1990/2582