Poverty and crime

Abstract

Crime and fear of crime have emerged as major public and political issues in recent decades. This may, in part, be attributed to the enormous growth in recorded crime since the 1970s, where crimes recorded by the police have been averaging at approximately 5% per annum, reaching 5.4 million in 1992. Government departments have not been alone in believing that crime is disproportionately experienced by ‘poor’ people. Many criminologists also support this view, particularly those operating within the ‘left realist’ paradigm. The measurement of crime presents a major problem for criminologists. Many crimes are neither reported nor recorded, resulting in the police crime statistics underestimating the ‘real’ level of crime. In the Breadline Britain survey, fear of crime was assessed by asking respondents whether they or members of their household felt unsafe in their local neighbourhood. Criminologists often maintain that it is the ‘poor’ or the working class who suffer the most crime.