Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration
Department of Economics, University College London
Drayton House, 30 Gordon Street, London WC1H 0AX
Discussion Paper Series
CDP No 12/10
Crime and Immigration: Evidence from
Large Immigrant Waves
Brian Bell, Stephen Machin and Francesco Fasani
Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration
Department of Economics, Drayton House, 30 Gordon Street, London WC1H 0AX
Telephone Number: +44 (0)20 7679 5888
Facsimile Number: +44 (0)20 7679 1068
CReAM Discussion Paper No 12/10
Crime and Immigration: Evidence from
Large Immigrant Waves
Brian Bell*, Stephen Machin† and Francesco Fasani‡
* Centre for Economic Performance, London School of Economics
† Department of Economics, University College London and Centre for Economic
Performance, London School of Economics
‡ Department of Economics and Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration, University
College London
Non-Technical Abstract
This paper examines the relationship between immigration and crime in a setting where
large migration flows offer an opportunity to carefully appraise whether the populist view
that immigrants cause crime is borne out by rigorous evidence. We consider possible crime
effects from two large waves of immigration that recently occurred in the UK. The first of
these was the late 1990s/early 2000s wave of asylum seekers, and the second the large
inflow of workers from EU accession countries that took place from 2004. A simple
economics of crime model, when dovetailed with facts about the relative labour market
position of these migrant groups, suggests net returns to criminal activity are likely to be
very different for the two waves. In fact, we show that the first wave led to a small rise in
property crime, whilst the second wave had no such impact. There was no observable effect
on violent crime for either wave. Nor were immigrant arrest rates different to natives.
Evidence from victimization data also suggests that the changes in crime rates during the
immigrant waves cannot be ascribed to crimes aga