The relationship between unemployment, inequality and crime has been studied by academics for over 50 years. While the idea that flourishing labour markets reduce crime and in turn large unemployment increases crime appears obvious to many and is subscribed to by policy makers and academics around the world, empirical results have failed to a large extent to support this hypothesis.
A 2010 paper by University of Georgia scholar David B. Mustard and the German Institute for the Study of Labour explored and resolved some of the disconnect between theory and empirics and confirms that labour market opportunities have important effects on crime and in particular property crime.
In the paper “How do labour markets affect crime? New evidence on an old puzzle” the author reviews decades of research and finds that although earlier studies established links between property crimes and unemployment, there was surprisingly little evidence to support the proposition that economic conditions influence crime rates.
Mustard focuses in his study mainly on the statistical and data problems that made it difficult to establish a link between the levels of unemployment and crime. In particular the types of crime and crime statistics used as well as the employment variables these are compared to are important factors, he found.
One problem is that data that uses averages across the population is seldom useful. “Ideally, we want to identify the variables that best measure the labour market opportunities for those who are on the margin of substituting between the legal and illegal sectors,” he said.
At the same time Mustard asserts that “research that includes both unemployment and wages consistently finds that wages are much more important for explaining variations in crime than are unemployment rates”.
“Studies that target labour market measures for those most likely to commit crime, specifically low-skilled young men and those who are employed in the low-paying retail sector, provide more convincing evidence to buttress the claim that labour market prospects and success reduce illegal activity,” Mustard concludes.
A crude comparison of statistical data on unemployment and crime in the Cayman Islands shows that different types of crime appear to be more strongly correlated to unemployment rates than others.
Since 2005, incidences of theft and robberies for instance have increased or decreased in line with the prevailing unemployment rates.
Such a link can, however, not be established for burglaries or crime as a whole.
For a more conclusive result, an effective study of the effects of unemployment on crime figures in Cayman would need to be based on a consistent method of data collection of both unemployment measures and criminal activity.
In contrast to economists, sociologists like Frank McField do not believe that unemployment rates will affect crime rates in a major way.
“A lot of people are looking at the unemployment issue as if it is unemployment that creates crime. But it is not the unemployment issue,” he said.
Dr. McField believes that crime is more closely linked to a power struggle by those that feel disenfranchised.
“A lot of people that I know who might be involved in criminal activity are involved with criminal activities not just because of the economic pressure, but because it is a way for them of asserting themselves,” he said.
He noted that there are a lot of people who cannot function in the regular work environment and the structures of society. At the same time Cayman’s economy is not diversified enough, which means that for some there is only a “narrow window of opportunity”. “And if you don’t fit into that you are out,” Dr. McField said.
For those that “are out” autonomy over their life and economic independence are still important values and “if you cannot succeed through the work process then the alternative is there,” he said.
Rather than caused by unemployment, Dr. McField believes early on in Cayman the “stigmatisation and criminalisation process was facilitated by the way the public and the government approached deviancy”, by placing criminals into institutions in Jamaica where they got into contact with hardcore criminals.
His focus would be to get to the kids as early as possible through early childhood education. This is not about “disqualifying the parental system”, he said, “but [about] being very aware that the parental system is no longer in all cases functional.”
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