Law enforcement and order: does police strength have an effect on crime?
Date
2012-01
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Abstract
Recent trends have shown that total crime has been decreasing as the number of policemen per region is increasing. This study aims to investigate whether these trends are an indication of efficient crime control and prevention by the police. Instrumental Variable Estimation was used to estimate the effects of unemployment, regional gross domestic product and police strength. The latter was instrumented by average temperature and regressed on total crime. In order to control. for time-constant factors, fixed effects estimation was applied. Results showed that independently, police strength does not affect total crime. However, police strength decreases crime when unemployment and regional GDP are also taken into account. .
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Keywords
Law enforcement, Police, Crime