January 14, 2020
Activities: Crime / Legal, Education, Employment, Health, Societal Benefit
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Annual ROI: 0.0%
Image source: Unsplash
Public education is a vital function of local governments. And making up the majority of annual budgets, its spending is often under the most scrutiny during public referendums.
Many studies have been performed that analyze the social impact and economic benefits of public school spending and performance. One of these studies, published by Penn State, outlines several key impacts and offers business cases for further investment.
The impacts of education are vast, ranging from employment to health to civic participation. And maybe most critically from a net-positive to net-negative perspective, education has a tremendous influence on crime in a given area.
The public bears a huge financial burden from crime and its related costs to society. The overall “price tag” for crime includes tangible and intangible costs to victims, court costs associated with the prosecution of crime, the costs of incarceration (infrastructure, staff, housing and food, counseling, prisoner education programs), the indirect economic costs associated with productivity and wages lost to both victims and offenders, and the decreased opportunities available to those with a prison record.
The National Institute of Justice estimates that these costs total $450 billion annually, or $1,800 for each U.S. resident (using data for the period between 1987 and 1990).
Public education provides one of the best opportunities to reduce crime and its cost to society by helping children to gain knowledge, skills, and character that help them avoid criminal activity. The following data demonstrates the strong correlation between the lack of educational achievement and crime:
– Roughly 41 percent of all federal, state, and local prisoners in 1997 and 31 percent of probationers had not completed high school or received a GED, while that was true of only 18% of the general population age 18 or older [59].
– Black and white males in prison and 20 to 39 years of age (Two-thirds of all state inmates in 1997) were half as likely to have a high school degree as the same group in the general population.
– In 1999, Caucasian men aged 30-34 who had not completed high school were four times more likely to have a prison record than Caucasian men of the same age who had completed high school; African American male drop outs aged 30-34 were two times as likely as those with a high school degree to have a prison record.
The main reasons that well-educated people are less likely to engage in criminal activity are related to their employment status and their perception of their own employability. Crime is more attractive to individuals who are unemployed or under-employed, or who consider their prospects for permanent, purposeful employment to be limited. Generally, studies show that the more formal education a person receives, the less likely he or she is to engage in crime, especially violent crime.
Levels of criminal activity within a community are generally lower when the average level of education is higher.
The public system of education is therefore an important buffer between an individual and the likelihood they will commit a crime because it is the first and most comprehensive employment and life preparation program available to all residents of the state. Quality schools improve personal and collective intelligence by improving individual problem solving skills, social perspective and ability, and employability. The lack of quality education or incomplete education is a major contributor to unemployment, crime, and incarceration.
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