The Low Wage of Crime

The Low Wage of Crime

You’re probably familiar with a version of this happy ending: people fly off to an exotic island, with millions of stolen dollars, pounds or euros packed in their suitcases or transferred electronically.

As typical as this scenario is for successful fictional bank robbers, it does not reflect reality. In fact, according to a study published in 2012 in a journal of the American Statistical Association and the British Statistical Society, the income from a typical bank robbery is barely enough to support someone for more than a few months.

The study was written by proffesors at the University of Sussex and the University of Surrey in England. They used econometrics – mathematical and statistical methods that are used to analyse economic systems - to interpret information on bank robberies that had been collected by the FBI in the US and by the British Bankers’ Association.

What they found was quite interesting. For example, a thief is likely to get only about $4,330 in a single bank robbery in the US. In Britain, a bank robber usually gets much more – the pound sterling equivalent of $40,000 – or nearly 10 times higher than in the US.

For the American, one successful bank robbery brings in nearly double what could be earned in one month from a full-time job at the current minimum wage. For the British robber, it’s an average annual British salary. This may sound good – but, to continue to support themselves, the American thief would have to carry out a successful bank robbery every month, and the British thief would have to do so at least once a year.

However, that’s an unrealistic project. To begin with, about one-third of bank robberies are thwarted during the act. Furthermore, one-fifth of bank robbers in both countries get caught sooner or later, and the stolen money is found. So, not only do they generally go to prison, they also earn nothing from the crime.

The researchers pointed out that the likelihood of being caught increased with each robbery, and that after four raids, bank robbers were more likely than not to be in jail.

The bottom line was that even bank robbers who get away with their crime one or more times would earn a better living doing something else.

(Living English 2 Bachillerato Workbook, p.45, Elizabeth Grant and Kaitlin Edwards, Burlington Books)