Snapping Back: Food Stamp Bans and Criminal Recidivism | Zendy

Cody Tuttle | Zendy

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Snapping Back: Food Stamp Bans and Criminal Recidivism

Author(s) -

Cody Tuttle

Publication year - 2019

Publication title -

american economic journal economic policy

Language(s) - English

Resource type - Journals

SCImago Journal Rank - 7.868

H-Index - 62

eISSN - 1945-7731

pISSN - 1945-774X

DOI - 10.1257/pol.20170490

Subject(s) - recidivism , regression discontinuity design , food stamps , commit , criminal behavior , violent crime , welfare , criminology , business , economics , law , political science , psychology , medicine , computer science , pathology , database

I estimate the effect of access to food stamps on criminal recidivism. In 1996, a federal welfare reform imposed a lifetime ban from food stamps on convicted drug felons. Florida modified this ban, restricting it to drug traffickers who commit their offense on or after August 23, 1996. I exploit this sharp cutoff in a regression discontinuity design and find that the ban increases recidivism among drug traffickers. The increase is driven by financially motivated crimes, suggesting that the cut in benefits causes ex-convicts to return to crime to make up for the lost transfer income. (JEL H75, I38, K42)

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