Valuation of Specific Crime Rates in the United States, 1980 and 1990 (ICPSR 3161)

Version Date: Jan 18, 2006

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Principal Investigator(s):
William Alan Bartley, Vanderbilt University

https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR03161.v1

Version V1

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Summary

This project was designed to isolate the effects that individual crimes have on wage rates and housing prices, as gauged by individuals' and households' decisionmaking preferences changing over time. Additionally, this project sought to compute a dollar value that individuals would bear in their wages and housing costs to reduce the rates of specific crimes. The study used multiple decades of information obtained from counties across the United States to create a panel dataset. This approach was designed to compensate for the problem of collinearity by tracking how housing and occupation choices within particular locations changed over the decade considering all amenities or disamenities, including specific crime rates. Census data were obtained for this project from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS) constructed by Ruggles and Sobek (1997). Crime data were obtained from the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Uniform Crime Reports (UCR). Other data were collected from the American Chamber of Commerce Researchers Association, County and City Data Book, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and Environmental Protection Agency. Independent variables for the Wages Data (Part 1) include years of education, school enrollment, sex, ability to speak English well, race, veteran status, employment status, and occupation and industry. Independent variables for the Housing Data (Part 2) include number of bedrooms, number of other rooms, building age, whether unit was a condominium or detached single-family house, acreage, and whether the unit had a kitchen, plumbing, public sewers, and water service. Both files include the following variables as separating factors: census geographic division, cost-of-living index, percentage unemployed, percentage vacant housing, labor force employed in manufacturing, living near a coastline, living or working in the central city, per capita local taxes, per capita intergovernmental revenue, per capita property taxes, population density, and commute time to work. Lastly, the following variables measured amenities or disamenities: average precipitation, temperature, windspeed, sunshine, humidity, teacher-pupil ratio, number of Superfund sites, total suspended particulate in air, and rates of murder, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, auto theft, violent crimes, and property crimes.

Citation

Bartley, William Alan. Valuation of Specific Crime Rates in the United States, 1980 and 1990. [distributor], 2006-01-18. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR03161.v1

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Funding

United States Department of Justice. Office of Justice Programs. National Institute of Justice (99-IJ-CX-0006)

Subject Terms

Geographic Coverage

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Date of Collection

1999

Data Collection Notes

  1. The user guide and codebook are provided by ICPSR as Portable Document Format (PDF) files. The PDF file format was developed by Adobe Systems Incorporated and can be accessed using PDF reader software, such as the Adobe Acrobat Reader. Information on how to obtain a copy of the Acrobat Reader is provided on the ICPSR Web site.

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Study Purpose

This study aimed to evaluate the explicit costs of crime to society. There have been two previous approaches to this problem. First, hedonic models sought to isolate the value individuals placed on specific amenities or disamenities, such as weather, air pollution, and crime rates, as seen in the wages they required and the prices they paid for housing. The second approach evaluated costs by combining the actual out-of-pocket expenses associated with crime with the imputed costs from the pain, suffering, and fear of crime. This data collection combined these two methods to obtain a market-based estimate for specific crimes. In particular, this project was designed to isolate the effects that individual crimes have on wage rates (Part 1) and housing prices (Part 2), as gauged by individuals' and households' decisionmaking preferences changing over time. Additionally this project sought to compute a dollar value that individuals would bear in their wages and housing costs to reduce the rates of specific crimes.

Study Design

The study used multiple decades of information obtained from counties across the United States to create a panel dataset. This approach was designed to compensate for the problem of collinearity by tracking how housing and occupation choices within particular locations changed over the decade considering all amenities or disamenities, including specific crime rates. Census data were obtained for this project from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS) constructed by Ruggles and Sobek (1997). To improve upon previous research, this data collection utilized Sample B Census data, which include information from more urban areas and also include urban areas that cross state lines. Crime data were obtained from the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Uniform Crime Reports (UCR). Other data were collected from the American Chamber of Commerce Researchers Association, County and City Data Book, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and Environmental Protection Agency.

Sample

Nationally representative sample.

Universe

All individuals and households in the United States in 1980 or 1990.

Unit(s) of Observation

Part 1: Individuals. Part 2: Households.

Data Source

Data were obtained from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS), the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the American Chamber of Commerce Researchers Association (ACCRA), the County and City Data Book, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the Environmental Protection Agency.

Data Type(s)

Description of Variables

Independent variables for the Wages Data (Part 1) include years of education, school enrollment, sex, ability to speak English well, race, veteran status, employment status, and occupation and industry. Independent variables for the Housing Data (Part 2) include number of bedrooms, number of other rooms, building age, whether unit was a condominium or detached single-family house, acreage, and whether the unit had a kitchen, plumbing, public sewers, and water service. Both files include the following variables as separating factors: census geographic division, cost-of-living index, percentage unemployed, percentage vacant housing, labor force employed in manufacturing, living near a coastline, living or working in the central city, per capita local taxes, per capita intergovernmental revenue, per capita property taxes, population density, and commute time to work. Lastly, the following variables measured amenities or disamenities: average precipitation, temperature, windspeed, sunshine, humidity, teacher-pupil ratio, number of Superfund sites, total suspended particulate in air, and rates of murder, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, auto theft, violent crimes, and property crimes.

Response Rates

Not applicable.

Presence of Common Scales

None.

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Original Release Date

2001-10-09

Version History

2018-02-15 The citation of this study may have changed due to the new version control system that has been implemented. The previous citation was:
  • Bartley, William Alan. VALUATION OF SPECIFIC CRIME RATES IN THE UNITED STATES, 1980 AND 1990. ICPSR version. Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University [producer], 2001. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2001. http://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR03161.v1

2006-01-18 File CB3161.ALL.PDF was removed from any previous datasets and flagged as a study-level file, so that it will accompany all downloads.

2006-01-18 File UG3161.ALL.PDF was removed from any previous datasets and flagged as a study-level file, so that it will accompany all downloads.

2001-10-09 ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:

  • Standardized missing values.
  • Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.
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Notes

  • The public-use data files in this collection are available for access by the general public. Access does not require affiliation with an ICPSR member institution.

NACJD logo

This dataset is maintained and distributed by the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data (NACJD), the criminal justice archive within ICPSR. NACJD is primarily sponsored by three agencies within the U.S. Department of Justice: the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the National Institute of Justice, and the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.