The Costs of Victimization
• Discuss the financial costs of victimization in the United States, including to individuals, businesses, organizations, and the general population.
Individual Costs
The three major types of costs that individuals often incur after victimization are medical care, mental health care, and lost wages (discussed under “employment” in the previous section). Beyond the mental and emotional costs, costs are also incurred repairing or replacing stolen or broken property. In addition, many victims take increased measures to prevent crime (additional locks, alarms, etc.), which also adds to the cost of crime for the individual.
Medical Care
Medical costs for victimization can be high. For example, the United States spends $229 billion annually for medical care related to gun violence (Follman, Lurie, Lee, & West, 2015); that amount increases as the cost of medical care rises. Violence not only causes loss of life but also long-term injuries and disabilities that can cost a lot in treatment and in terms of accommodation to ensure that person’s life can be as normal as possible post-victimization. In 2016, 1.9 million people were victims of serious violence, with two thirds involving a weapon; 39 percent involved an injury (Morgan & Kena, 2016). Homicides in 2013 cost an estimated $26.4 billion (Florence, Simon, Haegerich, Luo, & Zhou, 2015). When looking at the costs of homicide, compared to other types of death, surprisingly, homicide often has the highest costs followed closely by aggravated assault and rape (Wickramasekera, Wright, Elsey, Murray, & Tubeuf, 2015).
In the 2017 Las Vegas Shooting, many of the victims did not have adequate medical coverage. Some even had to start GoFundMe sites to help cover the costs of being a shooting victim. According to Masters (2017), “The average annual cost per admission for a firearm assault injury is $20,989, more than twice that of a typical hospital stay.” Rape victims pay, on average, around $900 of their own medical bill out of pocket (Crist, 2017). Thus, the cost of medical care, by itself, can pose a significant burden to victims, especially if they do not have insurance.
Transportation to medical facilities can be costly for victims. The average life flight costs between $10,000 and $15,000. Image: Life Flight. Authored by: Dee-Burke. Source: https://pixabay.com/en/jsar-search-rescue-911-999-2680392/. License: CC-0