Conditional treatment and its effect on recidivism*

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to evaluate the effect of the 1985 “Employment Services for Ex-Offenders” (ESEO) program on recidivism. Initially, the sample has been split randomly in a control group and a treatment group. However, the actual treatment (mainly being job related counseling) only takes place conditional on finding a job, and not having been arrested, for those selected in the treatment group. We use a multiple proportional hazard model with unobserved heterogeneity for job search and recidivism time which incorporates the conditional treatment effect. We find that the program helps to reduce criminal activity, contrary to the result of the previous analysis of this data set. This finding is important for crime prevention policy.