Crime Costs More Per Person Than The National Defense

Highlights

The cost of crime could increase to $2.1 trillion—or nearly 10 percent of the Gross National Product (GDP).

The explosion of violence in a wide variety of cities (many affected by recent protests) and a twenty-eight percent increase in violence since 2015 (per the Bureau Of Justice Statistics) has a correlation with reduced or flat national police-expenditures.

Author

Leonard Adam Sipes, Jr.

Retired federal senior spokesperson. Thirty-five years of award-winning public relations for national and state criminal justice agencies. Interviewed multiple times by every national news outlet. Former Senior Specialist for Crime Prevention for the Department of Justice’s clearinghouse. Former Director of Information Services, National Crime Prevention Council. Former Adjunct Associate Professor of criminology and public affairs-University of Maryland, University College. Former advisor to presidential and gubernatorial campaigns. Former advisor to the “McGruff-Take a Bite Out of Crime” national media campaign. Certificate of Advanced Study-Johns Hopkins University. Former police officer. Aspiring drummer.

Article

Many (most?) Americans seem oblivious to the impact of violence. What many in the justice system believe is the equivalent of cancer and an epidemic combined, most slough off as almost meaningless. If you suggest that crime destroys economies, education, jobs, mental health, and lives, most respond with indifference.

Maybe if violence in America was relayed in terms of personal financial costs, we could get someone to pay attention.

Murders roll off the tongues of evening news narrators with the same emphasis of a weather report. Literally, few care about the impact of violence, especially as it applies to cities.

The paradox is that we criticize officers with wild abandon yet there are few who beyond cops who face the true impact of crime. The rest of us buy guns or move to safer neighborhoods or blame cops for their “ineptitude” and “indifference.” Yes, some officers have made egregious mistakes. Regardless, the hypocrisy is astounding.

What’s Below

What’s below is a variety of reports addressing the financial cost of crime:

From The Crime Report (abbreviated or slightly modified quotes)

Crime costs more than $1,750 for every American — more than what the U.S. spends on national defense — according to a new study based on 2017 figures. 

Crime accounts for 3.2 percent of the Gross Domestic Product, representing more than $1,750 for every American in 2017 — more than what the U.S. spends on national defense.

The figure represents the toll taken by 121 million crimes, the most recent year used by researchers for their study.

They estimated “direct monetary costs of crime” at $625 billion, but when additional costs such as estimated quality of life and work days lost, the figure increases to $2.1 trillion-or nearly 10 percent of GDP.

“The costs of crime to victims and society far exceed the value of goods stolen or property damaged,” the authors said.

“Violent crime victimization results in medical costs, mental health costs, work losses, and less tangible quality of life losses.”

The U.S. spent $590 billion on military expenditures in 2017, and $450 billion on all social welfare programs.  Crime-related medical and mental health care expenditures totaled about $90 billion, representing about 2.5 percent of U.S. health care expenditures.

Violent crime accounted for 80 percent of the total. That includes sexual violence, physical assault/robbery, and child maltreatment.

The estimates exclude (emphasis added) the additional costs of preventing and avoiding crime such as enhanced lighting and burglar alarms. They also exclude crimes against businesses and most white-collar and corporate offenses.

The researchers estimated the total cost based on analyzing the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports (UCR), National Vital Statistics (2017), the National Criminal Victimization Survey (NCVS) from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, among other databases and surveys.

The estimated costs of crime were broken down into multiple categories: medical, mental health, work, property loss, public services (Police, Fire Departments, EMS, Victims Services, Courts, etc.) adjudication and sanctioning, and perpetrator work loss.

Homicides were the most “costly” crime, with 19,510 recorded murders in 2017, at an estimated total cost of $155,696,000, according to the authors.

The full study from the Social Science Research Network can be accessed here.

Data On Police Spending:

Half Of Police Agencies Report Cuts-USA Today

Facing the dual forces of the coronavirus pandemic and the national movement to “defund the police,” law enforcement agencies across the country are bracing for budget reductions not seen in more than a decade.

Nearly half of 258 agencies surveyed this month are reporting that funding has already been slashed or is expected to be reduced, according to a report by the Police Executive Research Forum, a non-partisan research organization.

Few agencies, regardless of size, are being spared. It’s being called a “perfect storm” and the biggest budget cuts in a decade.

The article cites a variety of examples as to the funding crisis and how law enforcement agencies are responding, USA Today.

Police Funding Has Been Flat For Years And Coincides With Increased Violence

Police spending started to decrease around 2009 after decades-long decreases in violent crime (which ended in 2015). Reduced violence coexisted with considerable increases in law enforcement funding up to that point, Defunding The Police.

Using the FBI numbers, the violent crime rate fell 48% between 1993 and 2016. Using data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics (National Crime Survey), the rate fell 74% during that span, Crime in America.

Police local spending per capita (inflation-adjusted) has been relatively flat with a small decrease (0.7 percent) from 2009 to 2017 after rising considerably (30 percent) from 2000 to 2009.

15 of the 25 largest US cities decreased their percentage (inflation-adjusted) of direct general expenditures devoted to police protection between 2000 and 2017.

Violence (and serious violence) started to increase considerably in 2015 during a time of flat or decreased spending and during a time where the percentage of inflation-adjusted city expenditures for law enforcement was mostly declining, US Crime.

The explosion of violence in a wide variety of cities affected by recent protests and a twenty-eight percent increase in violence since 2015 (per the Bureau Of Justice Statistics) has a correlation with reduced or flat national police-expenditures.

Police Spending-SafeHome.Org (slightly modified quotes)

According to U.S. Census Bureau data, state and local governments spent a combined $200 billion in 2018 (the most recent year with available data) on police protection and corrections, which equates to about five percent of their total spending.

Compared with a decade ago, a smaller percentage of spending goes to police and corrections. In 2010, it was 5.7 percent compared to 5.2 percent today.

Their analysis didn’t find any significant correlations between crime rates and law enforcement spending, but increases in law enforcement employment did appear to be at least partially correlated with crime rate declines over the past 10 years.

Editor’s note: SafeHome.Org generates publicity, profits, and name recognition through research.

Riots

The protests that took place in 140 U.S. cities this spring were mostly peaceful, but the arson, vandalism and looting that did occur will result in at least $1 billion to $2 billion of paid insurance claims — eclipsing the record set in Los Angeles in 1992 after the acquittal of the police officers who brutalized Rodney King.

That number could be as much as $2 billion and possibly more, according to the Insurance Information Institute (or Triple-I), which compiles information from PCS as well as other firms that report such statistics.

…the insured losses far outstrip the prior record of $775 million from the 1992 Rodney King demonstrations.

Source: Riot Insurance Losses.

Conclusions

I’m not sure there is anyone who fully understands the economic and emotional impacts of crime. We could state that violence costs America $2.1 trillion dollars or nearly 10 percent of the Gross National Product, and maybe then people would understand the personal impact of crime, especially violent crime.

As a former cop and the senior specialist for crime prevention and victim assistance for the Department of Justice’s clearinghouse, and as someone who has studied victimology and personally intervened in the lives of multiple violent crime victims, I understand that the impacts of violence are simply beyond the comprehension of most people.

It’s cops who live and breathe this stuff. Endless thousands of people are emotionally and financially crippled by crime every day. We know it happens to kids, battered women, abused children, the elderly, the disabled, the poor, and everyone else yet society lacks the emotional willingness to care.

But the public doesn’t hesitate to climb into your pocket to pay for it all, and that could be the only thing that prompts people to care beyond purchasing firearms (currently exploding) and running to safer neighborhoods (happening throughout the country).