|
|
Article: Socioeconomic conditions and property crime: a comprehensive review and test of the professional literature.
- Article from:
- The American Journal of Economics and Sociology
- Article date:
- July 1, 1996
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1996 Blackwell Publishers Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
I
Introduction
The economic theory of crime is a micro-theory which, postulating that a welfare maximizing individual optimally allocates resources according to relative returns, links socioeconomic conditions to the individual's relative returns to legal and illegal activity.(1) Sociological crime theories are more varied. Strain, ecology and opportunity theories relate adverse socioeconomic conditions affecting a group's social structure to the group's incentives and opportunities for criminal behavior. Social-control and learning theories link socioeconomic conditions to society's failure to control criminal tendencies and to the personal processes by ...