Experience Versus Expectation: Economic Insecurity, the Great Recession, and Support for the Death Penalty

Abstract

Scholars have theorized that people who report past economic hardship and those who forecast future economic instability will be more likely to support punitive criminal justice policies than those who do not. Only recently have researchers begun to empirically examine this association, and the findings from this small literature have been highly inconsistent. The current study contributes to this line of inquiry by investigating a uniquely rich set of economic insecurity measures included in a very large national survey (N = 9,060) fielded during a time period of special theoretical salience: the Great Recession of 2007–2009. Specifically, using survey data from the Cooperative Campaign Analysis Project, we explore the effects of experienced and expected personal, vicarious, and societal economic insecurity on support for the death penalty. Contrary to the hypotheses, expectations of future economic insecurity are negatively associated with death penalty support, but this relationship is conditional on respondents’ demographics.

Keywords:

• public opinion
• economic insecurity
• punitive attitudes
• death penalty
• crime policy

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Peter S. Lehmann

Peter S. Lehmann, MS, is a doctoral student in the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State University. His research interests include juvenile justice and delinquency, race, ethnicity and sentencing, and public opinion on crime and criminal justice policy. His current research focuses on theories of juvenile delinquency and the effects of justice system contact on delinquent youth. His recent work has been published in the Journal of Criminal Justice and Criminal Justice and Behavior.

Justin T. Pickett

Justin T. Pickett, PhD, is an assistant professor in the School of Criminal Justice at the University at Albany, SUNY. He received his PhD in criminology in 2011 from the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State University. Justin is the 2015 recipient of the American Society of Criminology’s Ruth Shonle Cavan Young Scholar Award. His research interests include survey research methods and public opinion about crime and punishment. He is currently examining cognitive heuristics and sanction perceptions. His recent work has appeared in Criminology, the Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, Sociological Methods & Research, and other leading criminology and sociology journals.