An Examination of the Link Between Employment Volatility and the Spatial Distribution of Property Crime Rates

Abstract

Abstract. Recent criminological research has produced inconsistent findings in its attempts to establish a statistical relationship between economic marginalization and the spatial distribution of crime rates. This paper contends that this inconsistency is partly attributable to the way in which economic marginalization has been conceptually defined and measured. By focusing strictly on unemployment and poverty as the processes that produce economic marginalization, researchers have ignored other important economic dynamics that can marginalize workers and provide an environment conducive to crime. Further, commonly used indicators of economic marginalization, such as the unemployment rate and poverty rate, fail to measure the full range of dynamics that produce marginalization. It is our contention that employment volatility represents an important source of economic marginalization that can help foster higher levels of criminal activity. This hypothesis is tested using regression procedures to analyze the effects of employment volatility measures and frequently identified structural correlates of crime on change in the rate of property crime offenses across 683 U.S. metropolitan counties during the 1980–1983 period. The findings suggest that high levels of employment volatility are conducive to the maintenance of higher levels of property crime in general, as well as less severe forms of property crime such as larceny, when such crimes are examined on an individual basis.