TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Meier, Armando N.
AU  - Levav, Jonathan
AU  - Meier, Stephan
AU  - Avnaim, Liora G.
        TI  - Early Release via Parole and Recidivism
        PY  - 2025/Aug/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 18076
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp18076
        AB  - Does early release decrease or increase the probability that ex-convicts will return to prison? We exploit unique data from Israeli courts, where appearance before the judge throughout the day has an arbitrary component. We first show that judges more often deny parole requests of prisoners appearing further from the judges' last break. We then use this arbitrary variation in early releases and find that early releases reduce the propensity of prisoners to return to prison. Robustness checks suggest that later and earlier cases are largely comparable and that potential selection is unlikely to explain the results.
        KW  - sentence length
KW  - early release
KW  - recidivism
KW  - parole
KW  - judges
        ER  -