Quote Originally Posted by Xiahou
Now, without wading into all the statistical gobbledygook, the single fact that they used total arrests rather than a per-capita number is quite eye-opening.
Summation of the authors' response:

Response to Foote and Goetz: Donohue and Levitt admit the programming error made in the original version of the paper and then go on to address the two points that Foote and Goetz make (see here for the reply). Donohue and Levitt contend that even though Foote and Goetz analysis was doing what Donohue and Levitt claim that they were originally doing it produces heavy attenuation bias (the reason they find no statistical relationship between abortion and crime). To remedy this, Donohue and Levitt use the improved abortion measures (that Lott and Whitley originally used) and they make other changes that they now argue are necessary, and they claim that with these new changes the results are smaller, but still statistically significant.

PDF of the full paper in response.

Hard to see how we can get very far into it without getting into statistical gobbledygook. Also not surprising that there's (gasp) an academic who disagrees with economic theories put forward in a bestselling book. That wouldn't be, I don't know, sort of a no-brainer for someone in a field that doesn't get much publicity?

[edit]

The upshot of their response seems to be, "Okay, we applied your corrections, and the numbers still show the same trends."