Panic on the streets of London: police, crime, and the July 2005 terror attacks
In this paper we study the causal impact of police on crime, looking at what happened to crime and police before and after the terror attacks that hit central London in July 2005. The attacks resulted in a large redeployment of police officers to central London as compared to outer London. During this time, crime fell significantly in central relative to outer London. The instrumental variable approach we use uncovers an elasticity of crime with respect to police of approximately -0.3 to -0.4, so that a 10 percent increase in police activity reduces crime by around 3 to 4 percent.
Mirko Draca, Stephen Machin and Robert Witt
1 August 2011
American Economic Review 101(5), pp.2157-2181, 2011
https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/aer.101.5.2157
This Journal article is published under the centre's Community Wellbeing programme.
This publication comes under the following theme: Combating and preventing crime, Crime