How does public policy impact trafficking victimization?: An exact matching study in the EU

Abstract

Trafficking in human beings (THB) is a widespread, transnational issue in the European Union (EU). Member states act as source, transit, and destination countries for intra-EU trafficking, in addition to being a major destination region for external THB victims. This study presents a new dataset of THB victims observed in each EU member state per year and by type of exploitation going back as far as 2001 and employs exact matching methods to test the link between different prostitution policies and Roma secondary education attainment rates on observed THB victimization. The paper also builds off previous literature to compare how different legal prostitution models and THB supply factors are expected to influence various types of THB. The results indicate that legalized prostitution and lower educational attainment among the Roma community increase observed THB victimization, especially THB for the purpose of sexual exploitation. The paper does not find that the Swedish model significantly increases or decreases observed THB victimization. In demonstrating how matching methods can be utilized to uncover policy patterns in THB outcomes, this study provides a blueprint for how other hidden phenomena, such as corruption or migration, can be robustly and empirically tested.