IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wpa/wuwple/0511002.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Shared Legacies, Disparate Outcomes: Why American South Border Cities Turned the Tables on Crime and Their Mexican Sisters Did Not

Author

Listed:
  • Pedro H. Albuquerque

    (Texas A&M International University)

Abstract

The article evaluates crime trends in south border American and Mexican sister cities using panel data analysis. The region offers a unique assessment opportunity since cities are characterized by shared cultural and historical legacies, institutional heterogeneity, and disparate crime outcomes. Higher homicide rates on the Mexican side seem to result from deficient law enforcement. Higher population densities in Mexican cities appear to also be a factor. Cultural differences, on the other hand, have been decreasing, and apparently do not play a substantial role. The homicide rate dynamics show opportunistic clustering of criminal activity in Mexican cities, while no clustering is found on the American side. Crime also appears to spill from Mexican cities into American cities. Homicide rates on both sides of the border have been falling faster than countrywide rates, leading, in the case of American cities, and against stereotypes, to rates below the countrywide rate in 2001.

Suggested Citation

  • Pedro H. Albuquerque, 2005. "Shared Legacies, Disparate Outcomes: Why American South Border Cities Turned the Tables on Crime and Their Mexican Sisters Did Not," Law and Economics 0511002, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwple:0511002
    Note: Type of Document - pdf; pages: 45
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://econwpa.ub.uni-muenchen.de/econ-wp/le/papers/0511/0511002.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ramos, José María & Shirk, David Ph.D., 2003. "Binational Collaboration in Law Enforcement and Public Security Issues on the U.S.-Mexican Border," University of California at San Diego, Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies qt92f7c3cw, Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies, UC San Diego.
    2. Becker, Gary S, 1993. "Nobel Lecture: The Economic Way of Looking at Behavior," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 101(3), pages 385-409, June.
    3. Reames, Benjamin, 2003. "Police Forces in Mexico: A Profile," University of California at San Diego, Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies qt1sq4g254, Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies, UC San Diego.
    4. Roberto Coronado & Pia M. Orrenius, 2003. "The Effect of Undocumented Immigration and Border Enforcement on Crime Rates along the U.S.-Mexico Border," Working Papers 0303, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    5. Fajnzylber, Pablo & Lederman, Daniel & Loayza, Norman, 2002. "Inequality and Violent Crime," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 45(1), pages 1-40, April.
    6. Miron, Jeffrey A, 2001. "Violence, Guns, and Drugs: A Cross-Country Analysis," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 44(2), pages 615-633, October.
    7. Kugler, Maurice & Verdier, Thierry & Zenou, Yves, 2005. "Organized crime, corruption and punishment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(9-10), pages 1639-1663, September.
    8. Morgan Kelly, 2000. "Inequality And Crime," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 82(4), pages 530-539, November.
    9. Dezhbakhsh, Hashem & Rubin, Paul H, 1998. "Lives Saved or Lives Lost? The Effects of Concealed-Handgun Laws on Crime," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 468-474, May.
    10. Ramos, José María, 2003. "Managing Transborder Cooperation on Public Security: The Tijuana-San Diego Region," University of California at San Diego, Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies qt6d13m8rc, Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies, UC San Diego.
    11. Levitt, Steven D, 1997. "Using Electoral Cycles in Police Hiring to Estimate the Effect of Police on Crime," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(3), pages 270-290, June.
    12. Eric Neumayer, 2005. "Inequality and Violent Crime: Evidence from Data on Robbery and Violent Theft," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 42(1), pages 101-112, January.
    13. Lott, John R, Jr & Mustard, David B, 1997. "Crime, Deterrence, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handguns," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 26(1), pages 1-68, January.
    14. Bronars, Stephen G & Lott, John R, Jr, 1998. "Criminal Deterrence, Geographic Spillovers, and the Right to Carry Concealed Handguns," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 475-479, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Pedro H. Albuquerque & Prasad R. Vemala, 2024. "Femicide Rates in Mexican Cities along the US-Mexico Border," Journal of Borderlands Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(5), pages 897-911, September.
    2. René Cabral & André Varella Mollick & Eduardo Saucedo, 2016. "Violence in Mexico and its effects on labor productivity," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 56(2), pages 317-339, March.
    3. René Cabral & André Varella Mollick & Eduardo Saucedo, 2019. "Foreign Direct Investment In Mexico, Crime, And Economic Forces," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 37(1), pages 68-85, January.
    4. Meirav Aharon-Gutman & David Burg, 2021. "How 3D visualization can help us understand spatial inequality: On social distance and crime," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 48(4), pages 793-809, May.
    5. Roberto Coronado & Eduardo Saucedo, 2019. "Drug-related violence in Mexico and its effects on employment," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 57(2), pages 653-681, August.
    6. Cabral Torres René & Mollick André V. & Saucedo Eduardo, 2018. "The Impact of Crime and Other Economic Forces on Mexico's Foreign Direct Investment Inflows," Working Papers 2018-24, Banco de México.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Soeren C. Schwuchow, 2023. "Organized crime as a link between inequality and corruption," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 55(3), pages 469-509, June.
    2. Altindag, Duha T., 2012. "Crime and unemployment: Evidence from Europe," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 145-157.
    3. Povilas Lastauskas & Eirini Tatsi, 2013. "Spatial Nexus in Crime and unemployment in Times of crisis: Evidence from Germany," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 1359, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    4. Briggs Depew & Isaac D. Swensen, 2019. "The Decision to Carry: The Effect of Crime on Concealed-Carry Applications," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 54(4), pages 1121-1153.
    5. Lin, Ming-Jen, 2009. "More police, less crime: Evidence from US state data," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(2), pages 73-80, June.
    6. Rudolph, Maximilian & Starke, Peter, 2020. "How does the welfare state reduce crime? The effect of program characteristics and decommodification across 18 OECD-countries," Journal of Criminal Justice, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    7. Lauridsen, Jørgen T. & Zeren, Fatma & Ari, Ay?E, 2015. "Is Crime in Turkey Economically Rational?/¿Es económicamente racional el crimen en Turquía?," Estudios de Economia Aplicada, Estudios de Economia Aplicada, vol. 33, pages 37-52, Enero.
    8. Raul Caruso & Adelaide Baronchelli, 2013. "Economic aspects of the complementarity between corruption and crime: evidence from Italy in the period 1996-2005," International Journal of Monetary Economics and Finance, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 6(2/3), pages 244-260.
    9. Cheng Cheng & Mark Hoekstra, 2013. "Does Strengthening Self-Defense Law Deter Crime or Escalate Violence?:Evidence from Expansions to Castle Doctrine," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 48(3), pages 821-854.
    10. Yamamura, Eiji, 2009. "Formal and informal deterrents of crime in Japan: Roles of police and social capital revisited," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 38(4), pages 611-621, August.
    11. Sebastian Leitner, 2015. "Effects of Income Inequality on Population Health and Social Outcomes at the Regional Level in the EU," wiiw Working Papers 113, The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw.
    12. Enamorado, Ted & López-Calva, Luis F. & Rodríguez-Castelán, Carlos & Winkler, Hernán, 2016. "Income inequality and violent crime: Evidence from Mexico's drug war," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 128-143.
    13. Marcel Fafchamps & Christine Moser, 2003. "Crime, Isolation and Law Enforcement," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 12(4), pages 625-671, December.
    14. Adenuga Fabian Adekoya & Nor Azam Abdul Razak, 2018. "Unemployment and Violence: ARDL Endogeneity Approach. (Desempleo y violencia: Enfoque de endogeneidad ARDL)," Ensayos Revista de Economia, Universidad Autonoma de Nuevo Leon, Facultad de Economia, vol. 0(2), pages 155-176, October.
    15. Yu Liu & Thomas M. Fullerton Jr. & Nathan J. Ashby, 2013. "Assessing The Impacts Of Labor Market And Deterrence Variables On Crime Rates In Mexico," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 31(4), pages 669-690, October.
    16. Buonanno, Paolo & Vargas, Juan F., 2019. "Inequality, crime, and the long run legacy of slavery," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 539-552.
    17. Dongxu Wu & Zhongmin Wu, 2012. "Crime, inequality and unemployment in England and Wales," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(29), pages 3765-3775, October.
    18. Barati, Mehdi, 2016. "New evidence on the impact of concealed carry weapon laws on crime," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 76-83.
    19. Steven N. Durlauf & Daniel S. Nagin, 2010. "The Deterrent Effect of Imprisonment," NBER Chapters, in: Controlling Crime: Strategies and Tradeoffs, pages 43-94, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Lastauskas, Povilas & Tatsi, Eirini, 2017. "Spatial Nexus in Crime and Unemployment in Times of Crisis," Working Paper Series 2/2017, Stockholm University, Swedish Institute for Social Research.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Crime; Border; Law Enforcement; Justice; Immigration; Mexico;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law
    • O18 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwple:0511002. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: EconWPA (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://econwpa.ub.uni-muenchen.de .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.