Crime, Imprisonment, and Female Labor Force Participation: a Time-Series Approach

22 Pages Posted: 14 Jul 2000 Last revised: 18 Jul 2022

See all articles by Robert Witt

Robert Witt

University of Surrey

Ann Dryden Witte

Wellesley College - Department of Economics; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

Date Written: November 1998

Abstract

Crime, Imprisonment, and Female Labor Force Participation: A Time-Series Approach Robert Witt and Ann Dryden Witte NBER Working Paper No. 6786 November 1998 JEL No. K14, H0 Rapidly growing prison population in the US has led to an upsurge of interest in discerning the impact of this costly increase on crime rates. Estimates of impact vary. We obtain new estimates of the impact of prisons using different data, specification and estimation technique than previous work. We find that both higher levels of imprisonment and increases in labor force participation of women are related to significantly higher crime rate. The impact of female labor force participation is much larger than the impact of imprisonment.

Suggested Citation

Witt, Robert and Dryden Witte, Ann, Crime, Imprisonment, and Female Labor Force Participation: a Time-Series Approach (November 1998). NBER Working Paper No. w6786, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=226386

Robert Witt (Contact Author)

University of Surrey ( email )

Guildford
Guildford, Surrey GU2 5XH
United Kingdom

Ann Dryden Witte

Wellesley College - Department of Economics ( email )

106 Central Street
Wellesley, MA 02181
United States
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National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

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