Do Welfare Drug Offender Bans Affect Recidivism?

长期以来，人们一直在研究福利和刑事司法系统之间的相互关系；然而，很少有人探索它们之间的联系，以构建个人之间的关键结果，例如犯罪。这个项目测试了刑事司法之外的政府机构的政策是否对塑造违法行为产生了影响。为了做到这一点，它将重点放在一项潜在的突出但经常被忽视的福利政策上，该政策可能会对犯罪行为产生严重后果。具体地说，1996年的福利改革政策包括一项条款，规定被判犯有与毒品有关的重罪的个人终身不得接受现金援助和食品券(1996年《个人责任和工作机会协调法》第115条a)。近20年过去了，目前尚不清楚这些政策对不再符合资格的个人的刑事犯罪和累犯率有何影响。这些政策是否通过促进政府救济金的自给自足来减少了越轨行为？或者，他们是否通过消除对经济拮据的人的关键资源而增加了冒犯？为了回答这些问题，这个项目检查了这些禁令对累犯结果的影响，包括逮捕、定罪、监禁和累犯时间。它还考虑了禁令是否产生了不同的影响，具体取决于福利计划、人口子群体、当地劳动力市场条件、犯罪类型和量刑结果。由于刑事司法机构面临严重的财政限制，了解福利政策是否加剧了犯罪，增加了有前科的个人的入狱人数，这一点至关重要。利用加利福尼亚州的行政记录，该项目将使用一种新的分析方法--回归不连续性(RD)分析--来估计禁令的因果影响。RD设计被认为是“准实验”方法，它利用处理变量的随机变化来近似试验设计的前后比较。在与毒品有关的重罪和公共援助禁令的情况下，RD分析方法解决了几个问题，这些问题阻碍了以前就排除的影响提出因果关系主张的努力。使用这一方法，该项目将提供迄今为止关于现金和食品券禁令对累犯的影响的最强有力的证据，并将提供考虑到刑事司法后果的福利政策的成本节约(或成本支出)的点估计数。此外，该项目将根据福利计划和人口子组，如妇女和少数民族，区分累犯的影响。它还将审查当地劳动力市场状况是否缓和了累犯禁令的后果，以及排除是否影响了某些类型的犯罪行为，如与金钱有关的犯罪，或量刑结果的类型，如监禁。

The interrelationships between welfare and criminal justice systems have long been studied; however, their connections for structuring key outcomes among individuals, such as offending, have been rarely explored. This project tests whether government policies of agencies outside of criminal justice are consequential for shaping law-breaking behavior. To do so, it focuses on a potentially salient but often-overlooked welfare policy that may have critical consequences for criminal behavior. Specifically, the 1996 welfare reform policies included a provision to exclude individuals convicted of drug-related felonies from receiving cash assistance and food stamps for their lifetimes (Section 115 of Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996a). Nearly two decades later, it remains unclear how these policies impact criminal offending and recidivism among the individuals who no longer qualify. Have the policies decreased deviant behavior by promoting self-sufficiency from the government dole? Alternatively, have they increased offending by eliminating critical resources to people in financially constrained circumstances? To answer these questions, this project examines the effect of these bans for recidivism outcomes, including arrests, convictions, incarcerations, and time to recidivism. It also considers whether the bans have had differential impacts depending on the benefit program, demographic subgroups, local labor market conditions, crime types, and sentencing outcomes. With criminal justice agencies facing severe financial constraints, it is critical to understand whether welfare policies are exacerbating crime and increasing prison admissions among individuals with previous convictions. Using administrative records from California, the project will employ a novel analytic method--regression discontinuity (RD) analysis--to estimate the causal impact of the bans. RD designs are considered "quasi-experimental" approaches that take advantage of random variation in a treatment variable to approximate pre- and post-test comparisons of experimental designs. In the case of drug-related felonies and public assistance bans, RD analysis methods address several issues that have hampered previous efforts to make causal claims about the effect of the exclusions. Using this method, the project will provide the strongest evidence to date about the impacts of the cash and food stamp bans for recidivism and will provide point estimates of cost-savings (or cost-expenditures) of the welfare policies given criminal justice consequences. In addition, the project will differentiate recidivism effects by benefit program and demographic subgroups, such as women and minorities. It will also examine whether local labor market conditions moderate the consequences of the bans for recidivism, and whether the exclusions impact certain types of criminal behavior, such as pecuniary-related crimes, or types of sentencing outcomes, such as incarceration.