Trend Analysis: One- and Three- Year Recidivism Rates
| Main (1) | Future Minimum Wage (2) | State-Specific Time Trend Polynomials | Division × Year FE (6) | Binding Changes (7) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Linear (3) | 2nd (4) | 3rd (5) | |||||
| Panel A: 1 Year Recidivism | |||||||
| Min. wage | −0.0091** (0.0040) | −0.0109** (0.0046) | −0.0042 (0.0039) | −0.0067** (0.0029) | −0.0065** (0.0026) | −0.0082* (0.0047) | −0.0097** (0.0048) |
| Future minimum wage change | −0.0041 (0.0028) | ||||||
| Bound minimum wage | 0.0006 (0.0339) | ||||||
| Min. wage × bound | −0.0006 (0.0053) | ||||||
| Wild bootstrap p | 0.059 | 0.061 | 0.335 | 0.053 | 0.010 | 0.141 | 0.071 |
| Observations | 5,786,062 | 5,786,062 | 5,786,062 | 5,786,062 | 5,786,062 | 5,786,062 | 5,786,062 |
| Panel B: Three-Year Recidivism | |||||||
| Min. wage | −0.0149*** (0.0044) | −0.0049 (0.0039) | −0.0044 (0.0039) | −0.0069** (0.0033) | −0.0149*** (0.0054) | −0.0162*** (0.0042) | |
| Future minimum wage change Bound minimum wage | −0.0247 (0.0328) | ||||||
| Min. wage × bound | 0.0038 (0.0049) | ||||||
| Wild bootstrap p | 0.010 | 0.231 | 0.266 | 0.067 | 0.028 | 0.001 | |
| Observations | 4,749,284 | 4,749,284 | 4,749,284 | 4,749,284 | 4,749,284 | 4,749,284 | |
Notes: The dependent variable is return to prison in the same state within one or three years of release as indicated by the panel title. Minimum wage is measured in nominal dollars and is measured in the state and month the offender was released. All specifications include state and year fixed effects, as well as the individual and time-varying state-level controls outlined in Section III. State EITC policy is included as a dummy variable, but its coefficient is not shown. For baseline means, see Table 4. Robust standard errors clustered at the state level are shown in parentheses (43 clusters). p-values from 1,000 wild-cluster bootstrap iterations are shown for the main minimum wage coefficient, as suggested by Cameron et al. (2008) in cases with a small number of clusters, typically ≤30 (our analysis is near but not below this threshold). Results are based off of Table 4 Columns 1 and 3, which are repeated in Column 1 “Main.” Additions to these regressions are indicated in the column headers. Future minimum wage change is the maximum minimum wage within the window 13–24 months after release minus the minimum wage 12 months after release; it is meant to measure a future minimum wage change that does not occur within one year of release—hence it is only included in the one-year recidivism results. Bound minimum wage is an indicator for a state–year that was bound by one of the three federal changes in 2007, 2008, or 2009—that is, had a state minimum wage below the new federal level at the beginning of the year.
↵* p < 0.10,
↵** p < 0.05,
↵*** p < 0.01 (based on cluster-robust standard errors).