Written by: Peter Fallesen Lars Pico Geerdsen, Susumu Imai and Torben Tranæs

This paper focuses on a previously unexamined effect of activation, namely the effect of activation programmes on criminality. The writers examine how a number of labour market reforms targeting recipients of social assistance affected the number of crimes committed. The reforms in question introduced earlier and more comprehensive activation of the unemployed, and can thus be used to establish the effect of more intensive activation on crime.