Research

Work In Progress

Place-based Policies in Deprived Neighbourhoods - Effects on Crime, Inactivity and Residential composition - co-authored with Damm, Anna P. and Ahmad Hassani. Summary of paper - CEPR Spatial Disparities and Policy Session at 12th European Meeting of the UEA 

Abstract: The paper evaluates a Danish place-based policy, which identified 26 deprived public housing areas with high shares of (i) non-Western immigrants, (ii) residents neither employed nor enrolled in education and (iii) convicted criminals. We estimate causal effects at both compositional effects at the neighbourhood and individual level effects of those initially living in the targeted areas by combining propensity score matching and difference-in-difference methods. We find that the policy reduced the share of convicted criminals living in the neighbourhoods by 10 %. At the individual level, the plan caused an 11 % decrease in conviction probabilities. Restricting the sample to (i) individuals staying in the treated neighbourhoods throughout the sample period and (ii) individuals with a criminal history, we find a similar reduction in conviction probabilities. The plan neither affected the share of non-Western immigrants and the share of inactives at the neighbourhood level nor the probability of an individual being inactive.

Refugee Influx and Crime - coauthored with Damm, Anna P., Ahmad Hassani and Timo Trimborn

Abstract: Large waves of refugees from low-income countries has sparked debate in high-income countries about the economic impact of migration. One relation particularly discussed is that between migration and crime. The literature on migration and crime has typically relied on the use of shift-share instruments to identify causal effect, a method which has recently been questioned. We circumvent this issue and estimate causal of effects of refugee influx on crime rates by taking advantage of the Danish Spatial Dispersal Policy, which distributes refugees according to a centrally decided quota system, neither affected by the refugees nor the municipalities. Using the quotas as instruments for the influx of refugees, we show refugee influx does not affect overall crime, property crime, violent and sexual crimes or drug crime neither in the short run (1 year differences) or long run (5 year differences). We rule out that our results are driven by substitution in criminal markets between refugees and established immigrants or natives or by changes in reporting behaviour as a result of refugee influx.     

Immigrant Competition in Labour Markets - solo-authored

Taxes and Tiebout-Sorting - co-authored with Hassani, A.