Brits prepare to block and tackle recession crime wave

With the headline, "Gordon Brown set to get tough on burglary," pledged action to prevent the recession leading to a crime wave.  Crime waves have occurred within one-year of every sharp economic contraction since 1954, and the crime wave that occurred during the great depression was indeed most serious.  

Importantly, like the leaders of the World Bank and IMF, the UK Prime Minister admitted that economic downturns can lead to increases in burglaries and robberies. The Mirror reported Brown as saying, "We face the challenge of preventing what happened in previous recessions, where crimes like burglary and robbery went up," he is expected to tell a conference in London.  

Getting public awareness on crime prevention and attacking serious habitual offenders is important, along with a myriad of other strategies reported in a book to be released next week written by Severin L. Sorensen, CPP, titled, Economic Misery and Crime Waves: the second great depression and the coming crime wave, and what we can do about it.

What Prime Minister Brown is doing is necessary, but insufficient.  What is needed is not just awareness of the crime wave coming, and blocking and tackling specific offenders, but also a focused strategy to hack at the roots of crime, not just block crime opportunity.  Situational Crime Prevention will be an important aim in crime prevention, but so also will meaningful job creation in sustainable long-term (5-10 year) with investment related employment schemes such as national science policy goal initiatives -- the options are many running from increased productivity, infrastructure, energy efficiency, clean water, etc.  Focusing on the clean energy of Nuclear power would accomplish this goal while being kind to the earth, as a nuclear energy program provides jobs from engineers, planners, scientists, on down to road works, construction, and laborers.  Whereas road construction projects are more lumpy in terms of employing lower skilled workers, as opposed to a broad sweeping program of job support throughout the economy.