Inequality and violent crime: evidence from data on robbery and violent theft
This article argues that the link between income inequality and violent property crime might be spurious, complementing a similar argument in prior analysis by the author on the determinants of homicide. In contrast, Fajnzylber, Lederman & Loayza (1998; 2002a, b) provide seemingly strong and rob...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2004
|
| In: |
Journal of peace research
Year: 2004 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (kostenfrei) Volltext (kostenfrei) |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
|
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Keywords: |
| Summary: | This article argues that the link between income inequality and violent property crime might be spurious, complementing a similar argument in prior analysis by the author on the determinants of homicide. In contrast, Fajnzylber, Lederman & Loayza (1998; 2002a, b) provide seemingly strong and robust evidence that inequality causes a higher rate of both homicide and robbery/violent theft even after controlling for country-specific fixed effects. Our results suggest that inequality is not a statistically significant determinant, unless either country-specific effects are not controlled for or the sample is artificially restricted to a small number of countries. The reason why the link between inequality and violent property crime might be spurious is that income inequality is likely to be strongly correlated with country-specific fixed effects such as cultural differences. A high degree of inequality might be socially undesirable for any number of reasons, but that it causes violent crime is far from proven |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 1460-3578 |
| DOI: | 10.1177/0022343305049669 |