NCJ Number
102176
Date Published
1985
Length
238 pages
Annotation
Data from 1980 on crime, population characteristics, and law enforcement employment and expenditures formed the basis of an analysis of the relationship between crime rates and clearance rates for seven crimes: murder, rape, aggravated assault, robbery, burglary, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft.
Abstract
Data were gathered and aggregated by Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas. Both deterrence and overload theories were incorporated into a nonrecursive model in which crime rates and clearance rates were simultaneously and jointly determined. The model held only for the crime of robbery. Estimations were then done for two models that included either the crime rate or the clearance rate as a predictor variable. The relationship between the crime and clearance rates was much stronger for property crimes than for violent crimes. Several variables significantly predict the crime rates. Income inequality has a positive relationship with clearance of property crimes, whereas poverty has a negative relationship. Discussion of implications for sociological and criminological theories, data tables, footnotes, figures, appended methodological information and results, and 203 references. (Author abstract modified)