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Economic Model Of Crime Essay

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In this essay I will analyse the United Kingdom government policies and events and evaluate their likely impact on crime. Crime is 'an action or omission which constitutes an offence and is punishable by law' (The Oxford Dictionary). According to the economic model of crime (Becker, 1968) the decision rule for a potential criminal is U(WL) < (1 − p) ∗ U(WC ) − p ∗ U(S) where U(WL) means utility derived from legal work, P means likelihood of getting caught when engaging in criminal activity, U(WC ) means utility from successful crime (only if not caught, happens with probability 1 − p), U(S) means disutility from punishment when getting caught (happens with probability p). Basically, criminals weights costs and benefits of criminal activities …show more content…

One of the things United Kingdom government tried to do by using this policy is to make the utility derived from legal work more attractive than the utility from successful crime (if not get caught) as crimes will not be committed if the utility derived from legal work is greater than the utility from successful crime. According to LPC chair David Norgrove (2012), national minimum wage was first introduced in April 1999, it is the minimum amount of pay per hour all the workers must get by law. The current national minimum rage in the United Kingdom now has been increased by government and it is currently 75% higher than the rate in 1999. Every legal worker is entitled to the national minimum wage and the employers are obligated to pay the workers they hire minimum wage, which is the utility derived from legal work. If an employer fails to do so, they will get fined or even taken to the court (Peter Dominiczak, Political Editor (31st Aug 2015)). The current minimum wage rate for workers who are aged 21 and over is £6.70, 18 to 20 is £5.30, under 18 is £3.87 and £3.30 for apprentices as reported by the BBC news (2008). As the minimum wage is the utility derived from legal work, when government increases it, it increases the earnings from a legitimate work. When the earnings from a legitimate work are higher than the benefits of successful crime, individuals will decide to work instead of

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