Panel Analysis of the Intersection of Poverty and Economic Inequality Across U.S. Counties, 1990-2019

• In Event: 30662 - Section on Crime, Law, and Deviance Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 10: Crime Prevention/ Economics, Crime, Desistance

Abstract

The relationship between poverty, economic inequality, and crime has been widely debated, particularly regarding their contingent effects. Empirical findings from panel data often contradict those from cross-sectional studies, which fail to account for the serial feedback loops between economic deprivation and crime. Methodologically, traditional interaction models using continuous measures frequently violate the assumption of monotonic effects and underestimate the heterogeneity in the contingent effects of absolute and relative deprivation. These methodological limitations have significant implications for theoretical development. In theory, different forms of economic deprivation may exert criminogenic influences along the dual spectrum of poverty and economic inequality. Moreover, crime may become particularly prevalent in contexts characterized by both extreme poverty and extreme economic inequality, where weakened social control and heightened social conflict resemble the criminogenic outcome of extreme disadvantage. These theoretical complexities remain underexplored.
This study proposes a typological framework of dual economic deprivation to address the empirical, methodological, and theoretical challenges in the crime-economic deprivation relationship. Based on the 3109 U.S. continental counties from 1990 to 2019, two-way panel fixed effects modeling shows that counties experiencing inequality prevalence and contingent deprivation (high-poverty and high-inequality) tend to have higher homicide, violent, and property crime rates, aligned with the relative deprivation theory and extreme disadvantage. On the other hand, poverty prevalence, an indicator of the social disorganization theory, is insignificant. The cross-lagged modeling with fixed effects controlling the serial reciprocity of crime is also in line with these findings with smaller standard errors, controlling for the serial reciprocity of crime; inequality prevalence and contingent deprivation are found to stimulate crime more contemporaneously than longitudinally. Collectively, this study suggests the typology of dual economic deprivation as a practical alternative for untangling the contingent association between poverty, economic inequality, and crime. More discussions are provided with respect to theoretical and policy implications.

Author

• Chin-Han Chan, University at Albany, SUNY