Why Does Education Reduce Crime

Bibliographic Data

ID10177643
AuthorsBrian Bell (0000-0001-8577-7430), Rui Ponte Costa (0000-0003-2595-2027, London School of Economics and Political Science), Rui Costa (0000-0003-2408-2947), Stephen Machin (0009-0004-8130-2701, London School of Economics and Political Science)
Year2021
Volume130
Issue3
Pages732-765
Publication date2021-10-28
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Political Economy (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-3808 • E-ISSN: 1537-534X
PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1086/717895
OpenAlexW3124825233
LanguageEN
Citations received18
References cited30

Prior research shows reduced criminality to be a beneficial consequence of education policies that raise the school leaving age. This paper studies how crime reductions occurred in a sequence of state-level dropout age reforms enacted between 1980 and 2010 in the United States. These reforms changed the shape of crime-age profiles, reflecting both a temporary incapacitation effect and a more sustained, longer run crime reducing effect. In contrast to the previous research looking at earlier US education reforms, crime reduction does not arise solely as a result of education improvements, and so the observed longer run effect is interpreted as dynamic incapacitation. Additional evidence based on longitudinal data combined with an education reform from a different setting in Australia corroborates the finding of dynamic incapacitation underpinning education policy-induced crime reduction

Demographic economics · Dropout (neural networks · Economic growth · Economics · Education policy · Higher education · Longitudinal data · Political science · School dropout · Sociology · State (computer science · Underpinning · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis · Demography · Engineering

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Open DOIOpen Access