Citation

Kovandzic TV. Criminology 2001; 39(1): 179-204.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2001, American Society of Criminology)

DOI

10.1111/j.1745-9125.2001.tb00920.x

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Research examining the impact of habitual offender laws on crime has suffered from numerous methodological problems, including failure to consider incapacitation effects that may be responsible for most of the laws' impact but that may not appear until years after the law is passed; not addressing simultaneity issues; and omitting needed control variables to avoid spurious or suppressed results. The present study specifies procedures that can be used to mitigate these problems. These procedures are used in the current study to estimate the impact of Florida's habitual offender law on crime using a multiple time series design, with data for 58 counties from 1980–1998.