Greg Mankiw's Blog: Pornography and rape are substitutes
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Pornography and rape are substitutes
Todd D. Kendall, an economist at Clemson University, reports that more pornography leads to less rape:
Thanks to David Friedman for the pointer.The arrival of the internet caused a large decline in both the pecuniary and non-pecuniary costs of accessing pornography. Using state-level panel data from 1998-2003, I find that the arrival of the internet was associated with a reduction in rape incidence. However, growth in internet usage had no apparent effect on other crimes. Moreover, when I disaggregate the rape data by offender age, I find that the effect of the internet on rape is concentrated among those for whom the internet-induced fall in the non-pecuniary price of pornography was the largest – men ages 15-19, who typically live with their parents.
22 Comments:
Yeah, pornography is brimming with positive externalities.
Have you people seen how little girls dress these days? Heard of rainbow parties?
It's not all Clinton's fault.
What does this suggest for the feminist notion that rape is not "about" sex but about power?
I wonder whether the legalization of prostitution would also lead to a decline in rapes.
If Dr. Mankiw reads David Friedman he has a WILD side! Maybe he's even a closet anarhist?! Wow... this is totally trippy!
captiousnut, two wrongs don't make a right. Simply because the laws prohibiting access to pornography for minors are not enforced, it doesn't follow that you need to persecute a large, adult population.
Public subsidies for porn! Non-rival, non-excludable, positive externalities... what's not to like?
I'll vote for any Presidential candidate who will nominate Greg Mankiw as Secretary of Porn.
This stuff is pretty obvious.
I am sensitive to the anti-rape movements statements that "Rape is not about sex" and I understand their motivations.
The fact remains, however, that the desire for sex is a strong factor in acquaintance rape.
Yeah, pornography is brimming with positive externalities.
Have you people seen how little girls dress these days? Heard of rainbow parties
To address this in the most detacted and nerdy way, I would have to say that this is interesting. Clearly, there are positive externalities for some of the people involved. Yet, how does this balance against the negative externality of upsetting captiousnut's sentiment.
Also, is there a dynamic element to this? Will captiousnut sentiment change if such things become prevelant. Presumably, the positive externalities will not.
gabriel you are correct, two wrongs don't make a right.
Nor does one right correct multiple wrongs.
That was kind of my whole point, perhaps muddled by sarcasm.
I double and triple checked my comment and can't find where I advocated "persecuting" anyone.
But I will look again.
This post has been removed by the author.
CaptiousNut, sorry! I made an ass of myself by assuming.
Utterly fascinating. This would seem to provide supporing evidence to what many social psychologists have been saying for years.
Utterly fascinating. This would seem to provide supporing evidence to what many social psychologists have been saying for years.
I wonder whether the legalization of prostitution would also lead to a decline in rapes.
Let's try to find data from the Netherlands before and after legalization, and try to control for other social changes like immigration and emigration.
I will do some work to be better informed but my first reading of his data indicates that while he may have a coincidence it is a weak case for cause and effect.
Another possible cause for decline in rapes:
Counter-cause out of our house in which I am the only male. Over the past 10 years there has been a rise in the education of women in casual self defense. I am not talking karate lessons but of writings and classes on avoidance of rape and physical response to repel. Some of this information has flowed into our house via the Internet and email.
Everyone in this house (except me) has been to class.
Given that at best the USA is up to about 65% Internet penetration of households at the endtime of this study... Where is the data that indicate that the lowlifes who commit rape are even accessing the Internet at all?
more is a day or two...
Economists should be cautious about extracting large lessons from bits of crime data like this. You can end up like poor Steven D. Levitt and his abortion-cut-crime theory: wind up reading in the WSJ and the Economist about how two other economists (Foote and Goetz of the Boston Fed) have exposed that your theory was based on two technical errors you made.
After reading the paper, I have to admit my initial positive reaction was hasty. I should hope this paper hasn't been peer reviewed. The presentation of the statistics is horrible! He reports the coefficients and Serrors in parentheses (or maybe those are the t values - point is that we don't know), but where are the t-values? (No, I don't feel like calculating them myself). What is the level of significance (even if I had t values I wouldn't feel like looking them up in a table). The author seems content in really pushing his coefficients (regardless of their statistical signifcance).
All in all, this seems like a paper that a graduate student would write, not a professor. He has some good points, but from what I gather only one age group was significant (to SOME degree - whatever that means).
And his link of internet useage to pornography is really weak. Off the top of my head I would think greater internet availability is highly related to "hooking up" in addition to "pornography visiting." So his results could be explained by individuals' increased likelihood of finding a consensual one-night-stand to releave the tension, as opposed to pornography. So why do we know it's not the hooking-up that is the substitute for rape? We don't. (Incidentally, hooking up would explain the positive correlation with HIV rates - wheras pornography does not). The funny thing is he mentions this possibility on page 28 but just dissmisses it and goes on with his porno theory!
I'm shocked this was even posted.
in response to the comment above, the internet actually seems to have a negative correlation with HIV rates- the reasearch is being done at this very moment
Another possible alternative reason why less rape and greater internet use in a city look like proxies: women become more likely to spend time on the internet and not go out on a Friday night to, say, a frat party or a bar where many acquaintance rapes happen.
What does this suggest for the feminist notion that rape is not "about" sex but about power?
Not much. I don't think many feminists believe that all rape is about power (and those that do are probably just influenced by the silly catchphrase, which is already inaccurate because rape by definition involves sex).
Reasonable feminists believe that there are multiple reasons men commit rape, the desire to exercise power being one of them. Thus, a reduction in the desire to rape among those who commit rape for other reasons being reduced by pornography is obviously consistent with the idea that some rapists do so for reasons of power.
Now, the "rape is about power, not sex" catchphrase is misleading in another way, because many rapists find the exercise of power in a sexual context to be sexually arousing.
Now, I suppose that the logic behind the idea that this study would indicate that the "rape is about power not sex" claim is incorrect is that the reason porn would reduce the desire to rape is that people can relieve their sexual desires through other outlets. However, if rape is "about power AND sex" (or "about power in the context of sex") then this notion is clearly consistent with this study. Some porn does depict the exercise of power (hell, some feminists say that ALL porn does)
Wow..I would have never thought that I would be discussing porn on a economic blog. If porn is a substitue for rape that would mean that the demand for rape would go up if the price of porn went up. Therefore, if congress passes a porn tax then we would predict to see an increase in rape. I would argue that the price of porn would have to go pretty high in order for the average person to decide that raping someone would be more benificial than paying a higher price for porn.
I don't know I see some truth in this. There are lots of people who get there kicks from looking at the porn fantasy. So with the increase and abundance of cheep porn it would make sense that the rape would go down. I also wonder though with the increase in the violent video games if this would lower murders. I know the media wouldn’t wont to report something like that but it would also make sense. I don’t know if the porn tax would really have to be that high considering that most of the stuff on the internet is free or extremely cheep. Or is it the ease of being able to look at the porn so discreetly the main attraction of it on the internet
It's wildly speculative to say that pornography and rape are substitutes, given that people can use the Internet for many other purposes. Perhaps instant messaging and rape are substitutes, or reading economists' blogs.
Going by the argument that porn leads to positive externalities, there tends to be an underproduction of it. The federal government should do more to develop this industry. Imagine the job opportunities and tax revenue it is likely to bring....