Fiscal transparency, public service provision, and criminal offense rates

Based on panel data from 269 prefecture-level cities in China from 2014 to 2023, this paper empirically examines the relationships among fiscal transparency, public service provision, and criminal offense rates. The study finds that higher levels of fiscal transparency are significantly associated with lower criminal offense rates, indicating that information disclosure plays a positive role in reducing opportunities for corruption and strengthening institutional deterrence. Further analysis reveals that improvements in public service provision help decrease crime risk, and that fiscal transparency indirectly affects criminal offense rates by enhancing public service delivery. In addition, the impact of fiscal transparency on criminal offense rates varies significantly across regions with different levels of government efficiency, with the crime-reducing effect of fiscal transparency being more pronounced in areas with lower government efficiency. At the same time, the heterogeneity analysis of urban area size shows significant heterogeneity in the negative impact of fiscal transparency on crime rates between high and low urban area size regions. The innovation of this study lies in exploring the mechanism through which fiscal transparency indirectly affects criminal offense rates via public service provision. • Fiscal transparency reduces criminal crime rates. • More public service provision lowers crime rates. • Public service provision mediates fiscal transparency's effect on crime. • The effect of fiscal transparency on crime varies by government efficiency. • The impact of fiscal transparency on crime differs by urban area size.