Poverty and Crime

My column in Mindanao Daily Mirror

Over and over again, it is seen that burglary, robbery and serious

assaults occur most frequently in the area where shanties are and the

family income is so low that it cannot suffice the needs of the

family. The houses are extremely overcrowded with few facilities.

Unemployment is very common. People in this area have little or no

formal education at all, and so mostly are unskilled.

Families are broken up. The mother has to go out to work and leaves

the children behind. With this kind of life, what will happen to the

future of this growing children, who are mostly out of school? It is

not surprising that they are often the victims of circumstances. They

begin to commit relatively minor offenses such as small scale thefts

and illegal gambling. Later on, because of poverty and deprivation,

they learn to commit violent crimes.

Look around in your surroundings ...

Crime is a complex problem. It can be classified in various ways.

There are crimes against people like rape, kidnapping, murder and

assault; also crimes against property include theft, arson, forgery,

embezzlement and vandalism; and the crimes against public order or

morality include drunkenenness, gambling and prostitution.

Crime has been a rather serious problem the fact that violent crimes

have become much more common these years then in the past. Despite

repeated crackdown by law-enforcement authorities, the situation many

times has not shown any improvement at all. What is even worse is that

studies have found out that the crime rate tends to rise faster when

quick changes occur in the society.

Also, crime is related to social values.

People were more obsessed with

the status, wealth and pleasure. This change in value must have been

an important factor in the mounting wave of crime. It is necessary to

emphasize especially in education the moral values and the traditional

virtues of being a good citizen. And most of all, if the unployment

problem of a country can be solved or minimize in future, we all might

hope that the crime rate will go down.