The effect of district attourneys on criminal justice outcomes

In the United States, elected district attorneys’ offices prosecute over 85% of all felony cases, but we know little about their effect on local criminal justice outcomes. Using a newly-collected dataset of district attorney elections, I show that Republican district attorneys lead to a 18-21% increase in new prison admissions in the two years following their election, while nonwhite district attorneys lead to a 10% decline. In both cases, there are no significant effects on local crime or arrest rates. These results show that the identity of the local district attorney is an important determinant of incarceration rates.

Here is the paper, by Sam Krumholz, on the job market this year from UCSD, that is not his job market paper, here is his full portfolio, public economics and law and economics, to me one of the more interesting candidates this year.