The cost of crime

For many families, serious crime has significant emotional scars, as they cope with loss of life, property and self-esteem, physical damage to body, mind and possessions.

The report of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) on Crime and Violence in Trinidad and Tobago reveals that official crime data for the period 1990-2013 indicate an annual average of 242 murders, 553 woundings and shootings, 4,217 robberies, 5,747 burglaries and break-ins, 247 rapes, and 127 kidnappings.

During the final five years of this period there was an annual average of 423 murders, 594 woundings and shootings, 4,445 robberies, 4,492 burglaries and break-ins, 232 rapes, and 139 kidnappings.

Data for 2013 indicate that there were 30.4 murders, 40.5 woundings and shootings, 221 robberies, 222 burglaries and break-ins, 16 rapes, and 8.7 kidnappings per 100,000 inhabitants in Trinidad and Tobago.

All of these in a country with a population of just 1.3 million people The IDB report makes a very important point that, generally, official crime statistics underestimate the level of victimisation when compared to self-reported victimisation data. For example, victimisation reported on the 2010 United Nations Development Programme Citizen Security Survey revealed that incidents of domestic violence were 6.3 times higher, and the number of robberies 4.6 times higher than in official crime data. The report also emphasises that official crime data is important in estimating the level of victimisation.

Beside non-reporting of criminal attack and suffering deviant behaviour without any recourse to justice, there is significant distress in multiple facets of our existence.

A popular approach is to summarise the various costs of crime and violence in a single dollar figure that attempts to represent the total cost connected with crime.

This is inadequate and underestimates much of the “cost” associated with crime.

The World Bank estimate of the socio-economic cost of crime highlights a number significant areas that impact us. The estimate outlines direct costs which include the value of all goods and services used to prevent violence or offer treatment to its victims or perpetrators. This will include medical, legal, policing, prisons, foster care, witness protection programmes and private security.

The estimate also point to non-monetary costs such as higher mortality rates as well as morbidity rates that result in pain, suffering and death. These are not associated with expenditures on healthcare.

Then there are indirect costs that include loss of earnings and time, lower human capital, lower productivity, lower investment and psychological costs.

It is important that as a country we pay attention to the economic multiplier effects generated by crime.

These take into consideration the impact on human capital, labour force participation, lower wages and incomes, savings and macroeconomic growth.

Over the last decade we have seen that fear of crime forces our citizens to shun activities and locations that we think make us more vulnerable to becoming victims of crime.

Many of us know people whose families have suffered from crime that tell us about the lower levels of life satisfaction. Crime also reduces tourist arrivals in the region, discourages business investment, and stifles economic growth. How many of us have curtailed liming at nights, and in certain areas? Crime is changing who we are — both individually and collectively.

Understanding the total cost faced by us all should provide the motivation to design a plan, adopt strategies, equip law enforcement, hire the brightest and best, provide facilities and training, and establish relationships with other law enforcement agencies to provide assistance. Fifty plus murders — just one of the facets of our troubling picture — in 28 days is far too many. Let us tackle this madness frontally and reduce the cost that we face.