The Effect of Punishment Regimes on Crime Rates

Description

Criminologists are interested in the effect of punishment regimes on crime rates. This has been studied using aggregate data on 47 states of the USA for 1960 given in this data frame. The variables seem to have been re-scaled to convenient numbers.

Usage

UScrime

Format

This data frame contains the following columns:

M

percentage of males aged 14–24.

So

indicator variable for a Southern state.

Ed

mean years of schooling.

Po1

police expenditure in 1960.

Po2

police expenditure in 1959.

LF

labour force participation rate.

M.F

number of males per 1000 females.

Pop

state population.

NW

number of non-whites per 1000 people.

U1

unemployment rate of urban males 14–24.

U2

unemployment rate of urban males 35–39.

GDP

gross domestic product per head.

Ineq

income inequality.

Prob

probability of imprisonment.

Time

average time served in state prisons.

y

rate of crimes in a particular category per head of population.

Source

Ehrlich, I. (1973) Participation in illegitimate activities: a theoretical and empirical investigation. Journal of Political Economy, 81, 521–565.

Vandaele, W. (1978) Participation in illegitimate activities: Ehrlich revisited. In Deterrence and Incapacitation, eds A. Blumstein, J. Cohen and D. Nagin, pp. 270–335. US National Academy of Sciences.

References

Venables, W. N. and Ripley, B. D. (2002) Modern Applied Statistics with S-PLUS. Fourth Edition. Springer.