The Deterrent Effects of Prison: Evidence from a Natural Experiment

被引：137
作者：
Drago, Francesco [1 ]
Galbiati, Roberto
Vertova, Pietro [2 ]
机构：
[1] Univ Naples Parthenope, Ctr Studies Econ & Finance, Naples, Italy
[2] Bocconi Univ, Univ Bergamo & Econpubbl, Milan, Italy
来源：
JOURNAL OF POLITICAL ECONOMY | 2009年 / 117卷 / 02期
关键词：
REDUCE CRIME; POLICE; RATES;
D O I：
10.1086/599286
中图分类号：
F [经济];
学科分类号：
02 ;
摘要：
The Collective Clemency Bill passed by the Italian Parliament in July 2006 represents a natural experiment to analyze the behavioral response of individuals to an exogenous manipulation of prison sentences. On the basis of a unique data set on the postrelease behavior of former inmates, we find that 1 month less time served in prison commuted into 1 month more in expected sentence for future crimes reduces the probability of recidivism by 0.16 percentage points. From this result we estimate an elasticity of average recidivism with respect to the expected punishment equal to -0.74 for a 7-month period.
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收藏
页码：257 / 280
页数：24
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