Abstract
This study aims to analyze whether public spending on education can contribute to reducing the homicide rate and whether it is necessary to observe this result over a period of time. In this sense, socioeconomic data from the Brazilian states and a dynamic panel model (GMM-SYS) were used to highlight the difference in education expenditures per capita, in addition to the contemporary relationship. The results indicated a negative elasticity of approximately 0.1 in the first lag, that is, if education spending increased by 10%, the homicide rate would decrease by 1% in the following period, highlighting that investment in education could be a form of long-term public policy to reduce crime.
Keywords:
Crime; Economics of crime; Education; Public spending; GMM System