Trust But Verify: Lessons for the Empirical Evaluation of Law and Policy

20 Pages Posted: 24 Mar 2012 Last revised: 11 Apr 2014

See all articles by Carlisle E. Moody

Carlisle E. Moody

College of William and Mary - Department of Economics; Crime Prevention Research Center

John R. Lott

Crime Prevention Research Center

Thomas B. Marvell

Justec Research

Paul R. Zimmerman

U.S. Federal Trade Commission - Bureau of Economics

Date Written: Jamuary 25, 2012

Abstract

In a recent article, Aneja, Donohue and Zhang claim that they are unable to replicate the regressions published by the National Research Council in Chapter 6 of Firearms and Violence. They conclude that the NRC regressions must have been based on bad data supplied by John Lott. The implication is that earlier studies that found that right-to-carry laws reduced crime were flawed because of bad data. However, we can replicate the NRC results with Lott’s original data and with the data set used by the NRC. The earlier studies are not flawed by bad data.

Keywords: crime, guns, firerarms, right-to-carry laws, shall issue laws, National Research Council

JEL Classification: K42

Suggested Citation

Moody, Carlisle E. and Lott, John R. and Marvell, Thomas B. and Zimmerman, Paul R., Trust But Verify: Lessons for the Empirical Evaluation of Law and Policy (Jamuary 25, 2012). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2026957 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2026957

Carlisle E. Moody (Contact Author)

College of William and Mary - Department of Economics ( email )

Williamsburg, VA 23187-8795
United States
757-221-2373 (Phone)
757-221-1175 (Fax)

Crime Prevention Research Center ( email )

Missoula, MT
United States

John R. Lott

Crime Prevention Research Center ( email )

PO Box 2293
1100 W Kent Ave
Missoula, MT 59801
United States

Thomas B. Marvell

Justec Research ( email )

155 Ridings Cove
Williamsburg, VA 23185
United States
757-229-3531 (Phone)

Paul R. Zimmerman

U.S. Federal Trade Commission - Bureau of Economics ( email )

601 New Jersey Ave. NW
Rm. 8103
Washington, DC 20580
United States

HOME PAGE: http://paul.r.zimmerman.googlepages.com/

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
794
Abstract Views
7,491
Rank
57,400
PlumX Metrics