Ending Rent Control Reduced Crime in Cambridge

Abstract

Using detailed location-specific criminal incident-level data, we find that sudden rent decontrol in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1995 caused overall crime to fall by 16 percent--approximately 1,200 crimes annually. We estimate that this annual direct benefit to Cambridge residents was roughly $10 million (in 2008 dollars), accounting for 10 percent of the growth in the Cambridge residential property values attributable to decontrol.