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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons

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Series

2008

College of the Holy Cross

Crime

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Crime Networks With Bargaining And Build Frictions, Bryan Engelhardt Sep 2008

Crime Networks With Bargaining And Build Frictions, Bryan Engelhardt

Economics Department Working Papers

How does the timing, targets and types of anti-crime policies affect a network when criminal retailers search sequentially for wholesalers and crime opportunities? Given the illicit nature of crime, I analyze a non-competitive market where players bargain over the surplus. In such a market, some anti-crime policies distort revenue sharing, reduce matching frictions and increase market activity or crime. As an application, the model provides a new perspective on why the U.S. cocaine market saw rising consumption after the introduction of the “War on Drugs.”


The Effect Of Employment Frictions On Crime: Theory And Estimation, Bryan Engelhardt Apr 2008

The Effect Of Employment Frictions On Crime: Theory And Estimation, Bryan Engelhardt

Economics Department Working Papers

I investigate how long it takes for released inmates to find a job, and when they find a job, how their incarceration rate changes. An on-the-job search model with crime is used to model criminal behavior, derive the estimation method and analyze several policies including a job placement program. The results show the unemployed are incarcerated twice as fast as the employed and take on average four months to find a job. Combining these results, it is demonstrated that reducing the average unemployment spell of criminals by two months reduces crime and recidivism by more than five percent.