Measuring Crime

This snippet from Jason Riley’s most recent Wall Street Journal column caught my eye:

A national survey of large businesses showed that retailers recorded nearly $100 billion in thefts in 2022, up more than 26% from the previous year. Walmart CEO Doug McMillon recently told CNBC that the rise in shoplifting could lead to higher prices and even store closures.

Walmart is the nation’s largest private employer, and it’s known for locating its big-box stores in depressed areas that need well-paying jobs and low-price products. Social-justice advocates who want to make it harder to lock up repeat offenders are inadvertently raising costs and harming job prospects for law-abiding members of our most vulnerable communities.

There’s presently some disagreement about whether crime is decreasing, increasing, staying the same, or what. This NPR article discusses the matter:

The FBI’s annual crime report for 2021, released earlier this month, says violent crime decreased by 1% from the previous year. But the report is also incomplete, as only 63% of the country’s police departments submitted data — and New York City and Los Angeles were not among them.

The FBI tracks seven major types of crime, Asher explains on Morning Edition. Property crime — theft, auto theft and burglary — has been falling regularly for the last 20 years. Violent crime — aggravated assault, murder, rape and robbery — increased at least in 2020, but remains lower than it was in the 1990s.

“But even that, when we talk about crime, is not what people think of,” Asher says. “What they’re really thinking of is murder and gun violence, and murder makes up 0.2% of all big-picture crimes every year. But it’s the crime with the most societal harm. It’s the thing that people tend to care about the most.”

The problems in determining the crime rate are even graver than they suggest. As a commenter here pointed out since different jurisdictions define crimes in different ways comparing apples to apples can be hard. In addition in some jurisdictions police have stopped responding to some crimes. That doesn’t change whether the crimes occurred or not but it does mean they don’t even make it into the records.

How do you measure things when your measurement tools become unreliable? The answer is that you use proxy measures. So, for example, previously I’ve pointed out the sharp increase in 911 calls determine to require a police response that don’t get them. That’s a proxy measure for crime. The statistic that Mr. Riley quotes (major retailers’ theft reports) is one of those proxies.

Another proxy is businesses and individuals leaving certain jurisdictions. Here in Chicago, for example, there is a notable flood of small and large businesses leaving the city. There are many factors behind that exodus to be sure but many of those leaving say outright they’re leaving because of crime. Take them at their word.