New Releases by Lucie Parker

This paper offers experimental evidence that crime can be successfully reduced by changing the situational environment that potential victims and offenders face. We focus on a ubiquitous but surprisingly understudied feature of the urban landscape -- street lighting -- and report the first experimental evidence on the effect of street lighting on crime. Through a unique public partnership in New York City, temporary streetlights were randomly allocated to public housing developments from March through August 2016. We find evidence that communities that were assigned more lighting experienced sizable reductions in crime. After accounting for potential spatial spillovers, we find that the provision of street lights led, at a minimum, to a 36 percent reduction in nighttime outdoor index crimes.

Crime rates have steadily declined over the past twenty-five years. Low-income individuals are more likely than higherincome individuals to be victims of crime. The majority of criminal offenders are younger than age thirty. Disadvantaged youths engage in riskier criminal behavior. Federal and state policies have driven up the incarceration rate over the past thirty years. The U.S. incarceration rate is more than six times that of the typical OECD nation. There is nearly a 70 percent chance that an African American man without a high school diploma will be imprisoned by his mid-thirties. Per capita expenditures on corrections more than tripled over the past thirty years. By their fourteenth birthday, African American children whose fathers do not have a high school diploma are more likely than not to see their fathers incarcerated. Juvenile incarceration can have lasting impacts on a young person's future.

How would you like to make postcards of the coolest places you can dream up in your imagination, or build your own magical aquarium? What about creating an Old West 'Wanted' poster with your little brother's picture on it? Now creative (and mischievous) kids can go as far as their minds will take them with Papermania! Cut, color, crease and craft away the day with 48 clever activities like creating a gum chart, making a 3-D movie theater and more.