Casinos and Crime Rates

Casinos and Crime Rates

William Reece has published* an extraordinarily detailed analysis of the relationship between the opening of casinos and crime rates, using a unique data set for Indiana,....

The economic model of crime [also] suggests that colser proximity of potential criminals and potential victims would increase local crime rates...lowering transportation costs between potential criminals and victims...increases crime rates..." (p. 146)

What he finds may be disconcerting for advocates of casinos as a tool for economic development. For several classes of property crimes (larceny, burglary, and robbery), crime rates rise significantly over the five years following the opening of a casino. Thefts of motor vehicles apparently rise in the first year, but then experience no significant change in the following years. So it appears that casinos do, on balance, lead to increaed rates of property crimes.

On a more hopeful note, assault rates apparently fall in the five years following the opening of casinos, and the incidence of rape is apparently unchanged. (These results are derived from his Table 2, on p. 153, and Table 3, on p. 155.)