U.S. Law and Order Edition: Indoor prostitution and police body-worn cameras

In this week’s World Bank Development Impact Blog, Berk Ozler covers research by GPA Health Cluster Leader and Associate Professor of Public Policy, Manisha Shah. Shah has a new paper (with Scott Cunningham) that is forthcoming in the Review of Economic Studies. This paper “Decriminalizing Indoor Prostitution: Implications for Sexual Violence and Public Health” investigates the impact effect of decriminalizing indoor prostitution on rape and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). The authors find that  while decriminalization increases the size of the indoor sex market, reported rape offenses fall by 30 percent and female gonorrhea incidence declines by over 40 percent. Please click here to read more about this research