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Economics 160

Economics 160. The Economics of Crime and Justice. 1. Outline for Today: 09/22/2011. Syllabus: course details Syllabus: Assignments by Lecture Number Current Criminal Justice Policy Issues Trends in California imprisonment and crime levels

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Economics 160

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  1. Economics 160 The Economics of Crime and Justice 1

  2. Outline for Today: 09/22/2011 • Syllabus: course details • Syllabus: Assignments by Lecture Number • Current Criminal Justice Policy Issues • Trends in California imprisonment and crime levels • Questions about crime trends and imprisonment trends • The Economics of Crime Control 2

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  6. Current Criminal Justice Policy Issues • Early release for primary caregivers who were not convicted of violent crimes or sex crimes • Los Angeles Times front page story, p. A1, Tuesday Sept. 13, 2011 8

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  8. Analysis/Questions • If less serious offenders are to be released early, why did we send them to state prison in the first place? • How do we measure the seriousness of an offense? 10

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  11. The Story Behind the Story • California state prisons are overcrowded and a federal court ordered a reduction of 30,000 prisoners by July 2013 • Former Governor Arnold Schwarzeneger and former California Attorney General Jerry Brown jointly appealed • The United States Supreme Court rejected their appeal in May 2011 13

  12. Current Criminal Justice Policy Issues #2 • Should California prisoners be transferred to city and county jails to reduce overcrowding? • Los Angeles Times front page story, p. A1, Tuesday May 24, 2011 14

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  14. Current Criminal Justice Policy Issues #3 • Will California sentencing laws re-fill the state prisons if the state meets the court order and reduces the number of state prisoners by 30,000 before July 2013 ? • Los Angeles Times front page story, p. A1, Tuesday May 25, 2011 16

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  17. Have California prisons always been overcrowded? • How did the prisons become overcrowded? • Why did the prisons become overcrowded? 19

  18. California State Prisoners Per Capita, 1952-2009

  19. Prisoners in California • From 1952-1979, imprisonment rates were fairly stable • Why did imprisonment rates increase about a factor of five between 1980 and 1995? • What was happening to crime rates in the years since World War II?

  20. FBI Index Crimes/Street Crimes • Violent Crimes • Homicide • Forcible rape • Robbery • Aggravated assault • Property Crimes • Burglary • Motor vehicle theft • Larceny theft

  21. Report to the Nation on Crime and Justice

  22. Observations • Crime is rising by a factor of four in the sixties and seventies; imprisonment is staying constant • Crime levels off in the latter seventies and eighties, imprisonment increases about a factor of five from 1980-1995 • Crime declines beginning in 1990 and continuing through the Great Recession, 2007-2009; Imprisonment levels off beginning in 1995 but does not decline

  23. Questions About Crime and Imprisonment • Do these disconnected trends between crime and imprisonment make any sense? • Why did crime increase so dramatically in the fifties and sixties? • Why did crime level off in the seventies and eighties? • Why has crime declined since 1990? • Why hasn’t imprisonment declined as well?

  24. Report of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation

  25. Question? • All this is fine and dandy. We are studying criminal justice, but how does it affect me? • Or, more to the point, how does it affect you?

  26. The Eggplant That Ate Chicago

  27. The Daily Beast

  28. The Economics of Crime Control • Objective: minimize the sum of damages to victims and expenditures on the criminal justice system • Damages to victims = loss rate* offenses, or in symbols r*of • Expenditures on the criminal justice system, abbreviated CJS, for law enforcement, trials (district attorneys, public defenders, judges) and operating jails and prisons

  29. Graphics: expenditure on CJS is easy $ 45 degrees Expenditure on criminal justice system, E on CJS, $

  30. The Graphics of Crime Control, if Crime Is Controllable Offenses, OF OF(E) E on CJS

  31. The Graphics of Damages to Victims, if Crime Is Controllable $ r*OF(E) E on CJS

  32. The Graphics of Damages to Victims Plus Expenditures on CJS $ r*OF(E) 45 degrees E on CJS

  33. The Graphics of Total Cost, TCTC = r*OF + E Total Cost (E) $ r*OF(E) 45 degrees E on CJS

  34. The Graphics of Total Cost, TCTC = r*OF + E Total Cost (E) $ • Economic Paradigm • Choose objective • e. g. minimize sum of • damages to victims plus • expenditures, E, on CJS • 2. Describe states of the world • (options for choice) • Total cost curve (E) • 3. Choose the best option Minimum Cost E on CJS Optimal Expenditure

  35. What Have We Learned • Even if crime is controllable, the optimal level of crime ( and damages to victims) is not zero • There comes a point where spending more on crime control, i.e. the CJS, costs more than is saved by reducing damages to victims, and this is where total costs start to rise above their minimum

  36. What If Crime, Or Some Types of Crime, are Not Controllable

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