This website uses cookies.

By clicking the "Accept" button or continuing to browse our site, you agree to first-party and session-only cookies being stored on your device to enhance site navigation and analyze site performance and traffic. For more information on our use of cookies, please see our Privacy Policy.

  1. Home
  2. Journals
  3. American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
  4. April 2012
  5. Indirect Effects of a Policy Altering Criminal Behavior: Evidence from the Italian Prison Experiment

Indirect Effects of a Policy Altering Criminal Behavior: Evidence from the Italian Prison Experiment

  • Francesco Drago
  • Roberto Galbiati
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
vol. 4, no. 2, April 2012
(pp. 199-218)
Download Full Text PDF

Abstract

We exploit the 2006 Italian prison pardon to evaluate peer effects in criminal behavior. The pardon randomly commutes actual sentences to expected sentences for 40 percent of the Italian prison population. Using prison and geographical origin to construct reference groups for former inmates, we find large indirect effects of this policy. In particular, we find that the reduction in the individuals' recidivism due to an increase in their peers' residual sentence is at least as large as their response to an increase in their own residual sentence. From this result we estimate a social multiplier in crime of two. (JEL D12, K42, Z13)

Citation

Drago, Francesco, and Roberto Galbiati. 2012. "Indirect Effects of a Policy Altering Criminal Behavior: Evidence from the Italian Prison Experiment." American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 4 (2): 199-218. DOI: 10.1257/app.4.2.199

Additional Materials

JEL Classification

  • D12 Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
  • K42 Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law
  • Z13 Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Social and Economic Stratification
There are no comments for this article.
Login to Comment