The Effect of Tourism on Crime in Italy: A Dynamic Panel Approach

27 Pages Posted: 28 Jan 2012

See all articles by Bianca Biagi

Bianca Biagi

Università degli Studi di Sassari

Maria Giovanna Brandano

affiliation not provided to SSRN

Claudio Detotto

Università di Corsica (Laboratoire LISA - UMR 6240 CNRS); CRENoS (Centre for North South Economic Research)

Date Written: 2012

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that, all else being equal, for the case of Italy, tourist areas tend to have a greater amount of crime than non-tourist areas in the long run. Following the literature of the economics of crime à la Becker (1968) and Ehrlich (1973) and using a system GMM approach for the time span 1985-2003, the authors empirically test whether total crime in Italy is affected by tourist arrivals. Findings confirm the initial intuition of a positive relationship between tourism and crime in destinations. When controlling for the difference between tourists and residents in the propensity to be victimized, no relevant differences are found: the likelihood to be victimized is quite similar for the two groups. As a consequence, agglomeration and urbanisation effects seem to be the main explanation for the impact of tourism on crime. One can image that overcrowded cities provide more opportunities to criminals to commit illegal activities regardless of the number of visitors and residents in destinations.

Keywords: Tourism, crime, externalities

JEL Classification: D62, K00, L83

Suggested Citation

Biagi, Bianca and Brandano, Maria Giovanna and Detotto, Claudio, The Effect of Tourism on Crime in Italy: A Dynamic Panel Approach (2012). Economics Discussion Paper No. 2012-4, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1994245 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1994245

Bianca Biagi (Contact Author)

Università degli Studi di Sassari ( email )

Piazza Universita
Sassari, 07100
Italy

Maria Giovanna Brandano

affiliation not provided to SSRN

No Address Available

Claudio Detotto

Università di Corsica (Laboratoire LISA - UMR 6240 CNRS) ( email )

Jean Nicoli BP 52
Corte, Corsica 20250
France

HOME PAGE: http://umrlisa.univ-corse.fr/

CRENoS (Centre for North South Economic Research) ( email )

Via Muroni, 25
Sassari, 07100
Italy

HOME PAGE: http://crenos.unica.it/crenos/

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