Education and Crime over the Life Cycle


We compare two large-scale policy interventions aimed at reducing crime: subsidizing high school completion and increasing the length of prison sentences.

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Abstract. We compare two large-scale policy interventions aimed at reducing crime: subsidizing high school completion and increasing the length of prison sentences. To this purpose we use a life-cycle model with endogenous education and crime choices. We apply the model to property crime and calibrate it to U.S. data. We find that targeting crime reductions through increases in high school graduation rates entails large efficiency and welfare gains. These gains are absent if the same crime reduction is achieved by increasing the length of sentences. We also find that general equilibrium effects explain roughly one half of the reduction in crime from subsidizing high school.

Citation

@article{fella2014education,
  title={Education and Crime over the Life Cycle},
  author={Fella, Giulio and Gallipoli, Giovanni},
  journal={The Review of Economic Studies},
  volume={81},
  number={4},
  pages={1484--1517},
  year={2014},
  publisher={Oxford University Press}
}

Author: gallipol

Giovanni Gallipoli is a professor at UBC in Vancouver. Giovanni's research focuses on the origins and consequences of economic inequality with a focus on how heterogeneity shapes individual behaviors and aggregate economic outcomes. Giovanni has worked on a variety of topics, including the equilibrium effects of policies that promote skill formation; the link between skill heterogeneity and a country's comparative advantage; the influence of families on long-term outcomes such as labor supply and consumption; intergenerational mobility and the linkages between parental heterogeneity and inequality; and how firm-level differences contribute to variation in workers’ skill returns. Giovanni is a recipient of the Killam Research Award, the FEEM Award, and the Young Economist Award of the European Economic Association. He is a CEPR research fellow as well as a former Fulbright Scholar and Weatherhall fellow. He serves as a member of the external board of overseers of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and as an associate editor of the Journal of Political Economy. Giovanni is an alumnus of the Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies and the University of Pisa in Italy. He received his Ph.D. in Economics from University College London in the UK.