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1 Michael R. Rand, The Prevalence of Crime 1 (1981)

handle is hein.death/prvcr0001 and id is 1 raw text is: U.S Departmnent of Justice Bureau of Justice Stati'cs The Prevalence of Crime The effect of crime is not limited to its immediate victims. The families of the victims suffer along with them, sharing their pain, hardship, sense of violation, and the aftermath of fear that crime can cause. This report explores a new way of looking at per- sons affected by crime, a measure of how many Americans-victims and the people who live with them--are touched each year by crime. More than 24 million households-- almost a third of the households in the Nation-were touched by crime in 1980. A similar proportion of house- holds has been victimized by crime in each of the 6 years, 1975-80, for which the measure has been calculated. The percent of households touched by crime has remained basically stable over the past 6 years, not only for crime as a whole but for individual types of crime as well. In fact, there was a slight decrease-from 32.0 to 30.0 percent- between 1975 and 1980 in the overall percentage (figure 1). This decrease March 1981, NCJ-75905 Households touched by crime is a new statistical indicator measuring the pervasiveness of crime. It was devel- oped from preliminary estimates from the National Crime Survey (NCS). Measuring Crime, February 1981, describes the NCS and the crimes on which the indicator is based: rape, robbery, assault, personal and household larceny, burglary, and motor vehicle theft. Copies are available from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, Washington, D.C. 20531. Benjamin H. Renshaw III Acting Director does not mean there were fewer crimes. Crime measured by the National Crime Survey (NCS) has risen every year since the survey started, but the proportion of American households that experienced this crime has re- mained about the same. The pattern that emerges from an examination of 6 years of data for the new households-touched-by-crime indicator is one of pervasiveness and consistency. A large minority of Amer- ican households experiences crime each year, although most of them experience it in a nonviolent form. There is great stability in the patterns from year to year, while the trend for the period as a whole seems to be downward. Race appears to have less to do with exposure to crime than does income or place of residence. A rural residence does ap- pear to afford some protection against both crimes of violence and crimes of theft, but it is clear that all Americans are at risk to an extent previously unknown. Detailed findings Most households touched by crime are victims of larceny (theft). NCS clas- sifies larcenies into two types: house- hold and personal. A household theft occurs when something is taken from the home or immediate vicinity by someone with the right to be there, such as a babysitter or domestic. A personal larceny may be pocket picking Figure 1 Households touched by crime, 1975-80 Number and percent distribution by type of crime 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 Percent of households touched by: All crimes 32.0 31.5 31.3 31.3 31.3 30.0 Rape 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 Robbery 1.4 1.2 1.2 1.1 1.2 1.2 Assault 4.5 4.4 4.7 4.6 4.8 4.4 Personal larceny 16.4 16.2 16.3 16.2 15.4 14.2 Burglary 7.7 7.4 7.2 7.2 7.1 7.0 Household larceny 10.2 10.3 10.2 9.9 10.8 10.4 Motor vehicle theft 1.8 1.6 1.5 1.7 1.6 1.6 Households touched by crime (thousands)* 23,377 23,504 23,741 24,277 24,730 24,222 Households in U.S. (thousands) 73,123 74,528 75,904 77,578 78,964 80,622 NOTE: Detail does not add to total because *These figures may not compute to of overlap in households touched by different percents shown because of rounding. crimes (see text).

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