Making Background Salient: The Effect of Online Criminal Databases on Offender Behavior with Hans Grönqvist, Erika Forsberg, Mårten Palme
Abstract: Modern technology has paved the way for easy access to a range of online databases that readily expose criminal records to anyone. Despite widespread concern that these databases impose an informal sanction attached to the stigma of being labeled a criminal, evidence on how being included in these databases affect the outcomes of ex-offenders is lacking. We examine this question by studying the unexpected launch of Sweden's first online criminal database in 2014 that provided unrestricted, anonymous and cost-free public access to the criminal records of every offender convicted in court. The database quickly became extremely popular to use with the average annual number of searches being close to 20 million, roughly two per living Swede. To estimate the causal effect of public access to this database we leverage register data and the fact that administrative rules only allowed the company behind the database to identify offenders sentenced before certain dates in the past. Our difference-in-differences estimates comparing the change in the outcomes among exposed offenders to non-exposed offenders show no significant effects of increased public access to online criminal records on outcomes related to crime and labor market outcomes. Most estimates are small and statistically precise.
Life After Divorce: Effects of Joint Custody on Parents and Children with Stella Canessa, Gordon B. Dahl, Anna Hasselqvist, Costas Meghir, Mårten Palme, Helmut Rainer, Olof Rosenqvist, Pengpeng Xiao
Abstract: Custody arrangements are crucial in determining how frequently and in what way children interact with each parent after a divorce. This paper explores the causal effects of joint versus sole custody on children’s and parents’ outcomes. We merge hand-collected data on the near universe of Swedish custody cases over 1992-2021 with several registries from Statistics Sweden to create a comprehensive administrative data set containing various child and parental outcomes measures. To identify the causal effects of joint versus sole custody, we leverage the random assignment of custody cases to judges, along with systematic differences in judges’ preferences for joint versus sole custody. We demonstrate that predetermined characteristics of parents and children are uncorrelated with the preferences of the judge handling their case, whereas judges’ preferences are highly predictive of the custody ruling in individual cases. Preliminary findings from the paper indicate that shared custody (i) has significant positive effects on children’s educational outcomes, (ii) increases fathers’ labor market attachment and earnings, and (iii) shows no significant impact on mothers’ labor market outcomes.
Alcohol Availability and Violence against Women with Arizo Karimi, Hanna Mühlrad, Petra Ornstein, Anna Sandberg Trolle-Lindgren
Abstract: Violent behavior is often linked to alcohol, with victimization surveys estimating that 40-60% of violent incidents involve intoxicated perpetrators. These findings suggest that targeted policy interventions reducing access to alcohol could help mitigate violence against women. This paper focuses on one of the most common alcohol-related policy tools: restrictions on alcohol retail store opening hours. Relaxing these restrictions may increase alcohol consumption, particularly in private settings like homes, where the risk of intimate partner violence is higher. To investigate this, we will leverage a natural experiment in Sweden. In 2000, the government permitted alcohol retail stores in six counties to open on Saturdays, lifting a prior ban. One year later, the ban was abolished nationwide. Using a triple-difference design and individual-level data on all reported suspicions of violence against women in Sweden, our preliminary findings suggest that the policy (i) increases alcohol sales, (ii) increases violence against women, and (iii) that the effect is concentrated in indoor settings and incidents involving known victims.
The Intergenerational Effects of Parental Incarceration (with Grönqvist, Palme and Priks), Economic Journal (Conditional Accept)
Identity in court decision making (with Ahrsjö and Palme), American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, 15(4):1-24, 2024
The Consequences of Electronic Monitoring for Offenders and their Families (with Grenet and Grönqvist), Journal of Public Economics 230,105051,2024
Residential Segregation and Crime (with Grönqvist and Robling), Scandinavian WP in Economics 2018 (Revision requested by: Journal of Public Economics)
The School Achievements of Refugee Children: Lessons from Sweden (with Grönqvist), Nordic Economic Policy Review, pp. 159-185, 2017
Intergenerational Transmission of Education among Female Immigrants, Review of Economics of the Household, 14(3), pp 715-744, 2016
Alcohol Availability and Crime: Lessons from Liberalized Weekend Sales Restrictions (with Grönqvist) Journal of Urban Economics, 81(3), pp. 77-84, 2014
Income Inequality and Health: Lessons from a Refugee Residential Assignment Program (with Grönqvist and Johansson), Journal of Health Economics, 31(4):617-629, 2012
Wage Inequality, Selection and the Evolution of the Gender Earnings Gap in Sweden, with Ahrsjö and Palme
Ethnic minority youths in the labour markets in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, with Schröder and Wadensjö
Using bridging courses to make better use of migrants skills, with Schröder
The Effect of Relative Income on Crime: Evidence from Micro-data
Våld i nära relationer: riskfaktorer och konsekvenser (with Karimi, Mühlrad, Ornstein and Sandberg Trolle-Lindgren), SNS Förlag, 2024
Bostadsområdets betydelse for brottslighet och barns möjligheter (with Grönqvist and Santavirta), SNS Förlag, 2023, discussed in multiple media such as Dagens Nyheter, Svenska Dagbladet, Sveriges Radio, Sveriges Television, Dagens Industri, Dagens Arena mm
Studiegapet mellan inrikes och utrikes födda elever,(with Grönqvist), SNS Förlag, 2020, discussed in TV4 nyhetsmorgon, Studio 1 Sveriges Radio, Svenska dagbladet
Ankomst och härkomst – en ESO rapport om skolresultat och bakgrund (with Grönqvist), Wolters Kluwer, Stockholm, , 2017, discussed in multiple media such as Dagens Nyheter, Svenska Dagbladet, Sveriges Radio, Sveriges Television, Dagens Industri, Dagens Arena mm (June 2017)
Bakom siffrorna - unga som varken arbetar eller studerar (with Schröder), Swedish National Board for Youth Affair, Stockholm, 2014, covered in multiple media including Dagens Nyheter, Svenska Dagbladet, Sveriges Radio, TV4 nyheterna.
Nyanlända utrikes födda på och utanför arbetsmarknaden(with Grönqvist), Expert report commissioned by the Swedish Ministry of Labour, included in SOU 2012:69 Med rätt att delta: nyanlända kvinnor och anhöriginvandrare på arbetsmarknaden, Bilaga 2, 2012
Inkomstskillnader och hälsa: Lärdomar från den svenska placeringspolitiken (with Grönqvist and Johansson) Ekonomisk Debatt, no 6, 2012
En introduktion till forskningsområdet inkomstojämlikhet och hälsa, Bokanmälan Ekonomisk Debatt, 2013.
”Utvärdering av arbetsmarknadsutfallet för deltagare i kompletterande utbildningar för akademiker med utländsk utbildning”, Expert report commissioned by the Ministry of Labour (with Schröder), 2012
”Underlag till utvärdering av verksamheter för yrkesinriktat mentorskap”, Expert report commissioned by the Swedish National Board for Youth Affairs (with Schröder), 2010