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Sports Franchises, Events, and City Livability: An Examination of Spectator Sports and Crime Rates

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2023

Robert Baumann ,
Taylor Ciavarra ,
Bryan Englehardt  and
Victor A. Matheson
Robert Baumann
Affiliation:
Department of Economics, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA, USA
Taylor Ciavarra
Affiliation:
Department of Economics, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA, USA
Bryan Englehardt
Affiliation:
Department of Economics, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA, USA
Victor A. Matheson
Affiliation:
Department of Economics, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA, USA
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Abstract

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We estimate the impact of sporting events and franchises on local crime rates using the technique developed in Arellano and Bond (2001). For events, we consider the presence of Major League Baseball, National Basketball Association, National Football League and National Hockey League franchises as well as whether a city held one of the respective championships, the Olympics, or World Cup matches. We find little to no evidence that sporting events or franchises are correlated with changes in either property or violent crime with two notable exceptions. The Olympics Games are associated with roughly a 10 per cent increase in property crimes while the Super Bowl is associated with a 2.5 per cent decrease in violent crime. On the whole, however, the presence of spectator sports does not seem to automatically carry with it any improvements in citywide criminal behaviour.

Keywords

L83O18R53Crimesports economics
Type
Symposium
Information
The Economic and Labour Relations Review , Volume 23 , Issue 2: Sport Economics , June 2012 , pp. 83 - 97
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2012

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