Freedomnomics
I have been reading Freedomnomics by John Lott. He is a good writer, and he is relentless in his pursuit of better economic models to explain the world.
Because I teach and often do research on economics and law, I have been especially interested in chapter 4, "Crime and Punishment". In this chapter, we learn that crime rates have been declining, but not because of legalized abortion, as argued by Levitt et al. In fact Lott presents a strong case that after legalized abortion, more teens had more unprotected sex, thus leading to more, not fewer, unwanted children.
This argument continues through the chapter: that when behaviour is constrained in some way on one front, people respond by altering their behaviour on another. E.g., when people are required to lock up their guns, accidental killings don't go down much, if at all, but robberies, etc., go up because criminals know that victims will not have ready access to their guns. And, as should be expected, Lott provides much more evidence that gun control laws are actually counter-productive, at least in the US. Despite his growing evidence that right-to-carry laws help reduce crime, politicians and victims still do not see the overall validity, on a probablistic basis, of Lott's analysis. For example, from a recent incident in Toronto,
More later on this intriguing book. For a comprehensive review, see this by Craig Newmark.
Because I teach and often do research on economics and law, I have been especially interested in chapter 4, "Crime and Punishment". In this chapter, we learn that crime rates have been declining, but not because of legalized abortion, as argued by Levitt et al. In fact Lott presents a strong case that after legalized abortion, more teens had more unprotected sex, thus leading to more, not fewer, unwanted children.
This argument continues through the chapter: that when behaviour is constrained in some way on one front, people respond by altering their behaviour on another. E.g., when people are required to lock up their guns, accidental killings don't go down much, if at all, but robberies, etc., go up because criminals know that victims will not have ready access to their guns. And, as should be expected, Lott provides much more evidence that gun control laws are actually counter-productive, at least in the US. Despite his growing evidence that right-to-carry laws help reduce crime, politicians and victims still do not see the overall validity, on a probablistic basis, of Lott's analysis. For example, from a recent incident in Toronto,
The killing prompted Mayor David Miller to renew his call for a total federal handgun ban and help stemming the flow of guns from the United States.In Lott's book, we also see evidence that as arrest (not necessarily conviction!) rates go up, crime rates go down. In general, it appears that Lott has found many instances in which if the expected value of something is changed by altering either probability of an outcome or by altering the value of that outcome, should it occur, then people often react by adjusting the other variable. And that's sort of a neat result, not unlike the Peltzman seat-belt arguments of several decades ago.
"It's time for the Canadian government to say to the U.S. 'we are good friends, but your gun laws are exporting a problem to our country and it is not acceptable any more and you need to take action,'" he said Monday.
Audette Shephard, whose only son, Justin, was shot dead in 2001, also called for a handgun ban. "Guns are a weapon of mass destruction," said Ms. Shephard, a member of Mayor Miller's community safety panel. "You can't defend yourself against a gun."
More later on this intriguing book. For a comprehensive review, see this by Craig Newmark.
Category: Economics, Economics and Law Posted on
Friday, July 27, 2007 at 1:07am
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Yes the title (and especially the subtitle) seem to go overboard. However, I think Lott's research is much better than that of Levitt et al. In comparing Freedomnomics with Freakonomics, I find Lott's book much easier to take seriously than Levitt's.