Extreme Deprivation and Violence: Does Sustained Deprivation Exacerbate Homicide Rates in U.S. Cities beyond Deprivation’s Direct (Linear) Effect?
In this chapter, we argue that high lev els of violence result when extreme re source deprivation is sustained in cities from decade to decade. Thus, we offer the first empirical test of resource deprivation conceptualized in this manner. Using an index of resource deprivation, this study investigates the evidence for a quadratic effect with high levels of deprivation as an instrumental variable for the population vulnerable to labor market downturns and economic strain in 151 large U.S. cities and in a subset of 66 high- homicide- rate cities for 1980, 1990, 2000, and 2010. Cross- sectional regression analyses produce posi tive, significant coefficients for the instru mental variable for three of the four time periods, indicating especially detrimental levels of deprivation on homicide rates in these cities. As hypothesized, resource deprivation is an important predictor of homicides across high- homicide- rate cities and over several decades. This has impor tant implications for future research and policy, including policy directed at improv ing schools and education.
