Prison vs. Probation: The Effect of Sentence Type on Recidivism

Aaron J. Sparrow, Princeton University

Over the last three decades, states have responded to increasing crime rates by enacting ever stricter punishments for a wide variety of offenses. While harsher sentences presumably have a deterrent effect, and certainly prevent offenders from reoffending while they are in prison, relatively little emphasis has been placed on rehabilitation. Consequently, many ex-offenders continue to commit crimes upon release. This study evaluates the effect of prison vs. probation on criminal recidivism rates in Florida. Changes in Florida's sentencing guidelines in the mid-1990s provide a natural experiment that can be used to estimate the causal effect of sentence type on subsequent recidivism. Combining these results with figures on the public costs of imprisonment and probation yields an estimate of the cost-effectiveness of these different sentence types.