Immigration and the Recent Violent Crime Drop in the United States: A Pooled, Cross‐sectional Time‐series Analysis of Metropolitan Areas*

Abstract

A good deal of research in recent years has revisited the relationship between immigration and violent crime. Various scholars have suggested that, contrary to the claims of the classic Chicago School, large immigrant populations might be associated with lower rather than higher rates of criminal violence. A limitation of the research in this area is that it has been based largely on cross‐sectional analyses for a restricted range of geographic areas. Using time‐series techniques and annual data for metropolitan areas over the 1994–2004 period, we assess the impact of changes in immigration on changes in violent crime rates. The findings of multivariate analyses indicate that violent crime rates tended to decrease as metropolitan areas experienced gains in their concentration of immigrants. This inverse relationship is especially robust for the offense of robbery. Overall, our results support the hypothesis that the broad reductions in violent crime during recent years are partially attributable to increases in immigration.

Five tests for a theory of the crime drop

“…This is not without reservation, since as one of its proponents notes, it has problems "not the least of which is whether such a theoretical perspective could be moved beyond the level of speculation and be subjected to more rigorous empirical tests." (Eisner 2008;312) All additional hypotheses are taken to pass the test for present purposes even though some are disputed and others claim only a minor role including demographics (generally found to account for around 10 to 15 percent -see Fox 2000) and immigration (Stowell et al 2009 claim it accounts for 6 percent of the crime drop). Blumstein and Rosenfeld are critical of the notion that changing demographics induced the crime drop, observing that in the US, "during the sharp crime drop of the 1990s, age composition changes were trending in the wrong direction: the number of 18-year-olds in the U.S. population was increasing while crime rates were declining for other reasons."…”

Why the Crime Drop?

“…The notion that immigration might have induced the crime drop appears to have been floated in a news article by Sampson (2006) and furthered in Sampson (2008). In a more extensive empirical examination of the immigration hypothesis, Stowell et al (2009) claim that it accounts for 6 percent of the crime drop.…”

Bringing Crime Trends Back into Criminology: A Critical Assessment of the Literature and a Blueprint for Future Inquiry

“…This includes arguments about the relevance to crime trends of growth in imprisonment and policing (see Zimring 2007) on the one hand and increases in immigration that revitalize community social organization (Ousey & Kubrin 2009, Sampson 2008, Stowell et al 2009) on the other hand. For purposes of identifying the proximate causes of changes in crime rates, emphasizing the commonalities among these factors directs attention to the need for research that considers more directly whether there have been important shifts over the past few decades in public and private surveillance, collective efficacy, and the perceived costs associated with criminal activity.…”