TY  - JOUR
AU  - Tauchen,Helen V.
AU  - Witte,Ann Dryden
AU  - Griesinger,Harriet
TI  - Deterrence, Work and Crime: Revisiting the Issues with Birth Cohort Data
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 2508
PY  - 1988
Y2  - February 1988
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w2508
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w2508.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Ann Dryden Witte
500 SE Mizner Blvd., # A904
Boca Raton, FL 33432
Tel: 561 361 4398
E-Mail: awitte@wellesley.edu
AB  - In this paper we analyze criminal behavior of a cohort sample of young men over an eight year period using random effects probit and Tobit techniques. Our major advances relate to our careful conceptualization general deterrence, and our data. As far as we are aware, this work represents the first time that a richly specified model of criminal activity has been estimated using panel data for a general population group. We find very robust evidence for a general deterrent effect emanating from police resources. Our results regarding general deterrence are open to fewer questions than previous findings. We also find that working and going to school significantly decrease the probability of commmitting criminal acts and by virtually identical amounts. This similarity of effect when coupled with other findings suggests that crime does not serve mainly as a direct source of income and that incentive effects emanating from higher wages are not very strong. There is little empirical support for the  crime as work' model that has dominated economic thought regarding crime over the last two decades. More fruitful models of work and crime may result if work is conceived as having its primary effects either through preferences or through information.
ER  -