Abstract

FRANCO MORA, Juan Sebastián. The usual suspects? Effects of irregular immigration on crime. Desarro. soc. [online]. 2021, n.89, pp.57-92.  Epub Dec 01, 2021. ISSN 0120-3584.  https://doi.org/10.13043/dys.89.2.

Previous research shows that irregular immigration can worsen perceptions of security. However, the real effect of irregular immigration on crime rates remains unknown. In this paper, we analyze the effect of irregular immigration inflows on crime in the recipient country. For this, we build a dataset of Venezuelan irregular immigration in Colombia and crime rates at municipal level between 2016 and 2018. Our specification is based on an IV strategy using the exogenous variation in distance to the borderline as an instrument for immigration. We find that the immigration shock caused a slight increase in two types of theft in the short run and no significative changes in violent crime. These results are robust when using different instrumental variables, applying special autocorrelation corrections, and including controls for police capacity.

JEL Classification: F22, H12, J15, K42.

Keywords : Immigration policy; Venezuela; Colombia.

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