Do Statutory Rape Laws Work?

The Effect of Statutory Rape Laws on Teen Birth Rates

“…In this instance-which is characteristic of many reforms-an empirical specification that assigns binary statutory rape law indicators according to a hypothetical offender age of 20 years old would register no variation in the law despite a potentially impactful change. Henry and Cunningham (2010) similarly estimate that an expansion of statutory rape laws is associated with an increased delay in sexual debuts. The authors define state laws by assigning each teen respondent an index variable equal to the span between the respondent's age and the age of a potential partner over which sexual intercourse is permitted-for example, an index value of 9 is assigned if a 14 year old is permitted to have intercourse with partners up to 23 years old.…”

“…Of course, any such effect presumes that the elder individual is aware of the law and is responsive to this threat. 6 Even if deterrent forces are strong enough to influence the decisions of the potential offenders, the net effect on sexual activity among the teenage population is ambiguous, itself depending upon the nature of the matching process between sexual partners and thus on the victim's decision-making process (Henry and Cunningham 2010). For instance, consider a given 15-year-old female whose desired match is a 20-year-old male.…”

“…Our analysis builds on both Jepsen and Jepsen (2006) and Henry and Cunningham (2010) in several additional ways. To begin, our simulation approach facilitates the subsequent evaluation of the impacts of severity enhancements, which were omitted from their analyses and which are difficult to codify through conventional methods (as discussed below (Sutherland 2003;Donovan 1996).…”

“…For instance, we hope to acquire geographic identifier codes within the NSFG records facilitating the ability to construct similar DD and DDD analyses in questioning the impact of statutory rape expansions on the onset of sexual debuts. The NLSY records considered by Henry and Cunningham (2010) also afford this opportunity.…”

Do age of consent laws decrease teen births?

“…First, teen pregnancy is regarded as an important social issue and determinant of adolescent health, education and socioeconomic status (Ribar 1994, Card 1999, Kirby 2001, Kearney 2010, Levine and Zimmerman 2010). The paper relates to the evaluation of criminal legislation for sexual crimes, for which there is relatively little evidence overall.Directly related to age of consent and statutory rape legislation, Jepsen and Jepsen (2006) and Henry and Cunningham (2009) provide US evidence of a negative correlation between statutory rape laws and teen births and age of consent laws and age of first sexual activity, respectively. More closely related to this paper, Frakes and Harding (2015) pool and analyze over 20 changes in age of consent and statutory rape laws across US states over several decades, including the 1995 Georgia age of consent increase, and present aggregate evidence that these laws decrease teen fertility, although little evidence of an effect for increasing punishment severity.…”