TY  - JOUR
AU  - Gan,Li
AU  - Williams,Roberton C.,III
AU  - Wiseman,Thomas
TI  - A Simple Model of Optimal Hate Crime Legislation
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 10463
PY  - 2004
Y2  - May 2004
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w10463
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w10463.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Li Gan
Department of Economics
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX 77843-4228
Tel: 979/862-1667
Fax: 979/847-8747
E-Mail: gan@econmail.tamu.edu

Roberton C. Williams, III
Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics
University of Maryland,
Symons Hall
College Park, MD 20742
Tel: 301-405-1284
Fax: 301-314-9091
E-Mail: rwilliams@arec.umd.edu
AB  - We present a simple model of the effects of hate crime legislation. It shows that even if the direct harm to victims of hate crime is the same as for other crimes, because of other differences in the effects it may still be optimal to exert more law-enforcement effort to deter or prevent hate crime. These differences also have previously unrecognized effects on the optimal level of effort by potential hate crime victims to avoid being victimized, thus affecting the efficiency of government policies that encourage or discourage such effort. We discuss the implications of these results for optimal hate-crime policy, as well as for policy toward other similar crimes, such as terrorism.
ER  -