Social Impact Investing

SOCIAL IMPACT INVESTMENT: BUILDING THE EVIDENCE BASE
Table 5.2: Indicators of Policing safety and crime trending in the right directions, but still have some way to go
Confidence in local
police between 2007
and 2012
Do you feel safe walking
alone at night in the city or
area where you live?
Persons brought into formal
contact with the police
and/or criminal justice
system, all crimes (Index
2004=100)
Prison rates
of over 18s
per 100,000
Prison
occupancy
rates
2007 2012 All Juveniles 2007 2012 2011 c.2013
Australia 78 80 … … 77.2 84.3 167.1 96.0%
Canada 88 87 97 89 77.5 82.6 96.4%
France 73 74 112 134 66.6 78.2 131.4 116.8%
Germany 76 82 … … 64 76.1 82.4%
Italy 74 76 118 93 75.3 74.8 132.5 128.8%
Japan 70 74 83 67 72.5 72.3 65.8 77.2%
United Kingdom 69 76 … … 63.1 68 111.2%
United States 78 78 89 73 57.9 67.9 939.5 99.0%
OECD 70 72 106 105 68.3 72.2 193.8 …
Note: For crime rate changes OECD average is an average of data for 23 countries. For prison rates (“Prisons, Penal Institutions or
Correctional Institutions” means all public and privately financed institutions where persons are deprived of their liberty. The
institutions may include, but are not limited to, penal, correctional, and psychiatric facilities under the prison administration. “Persons
Held” should exclude non-criminal prisoners held for administrative purposes, including persons held pending investigation into their
immigration status and foreign citizens without a legal right to stay held prior to removal) Canadian data is for 2010. Prison occupancy
rates United Kingdom data is for England and Wales only, data for Australia, England & Wales, France, Germany, and Italy are from
2013; 2012 in Japan and the United States, and 2009 in Canada.
Source: Society at a Glance (OECD, 2014b); citation of sources: Gallup world Poll, 2014 and United Nations Office on Drugs and
Crimes (UNDOC - www.unodc.org/). For prison occupancy rates author’s calculations of national informant data (available on
request).
5.22 Finally, prison rates and prison occupancy rates are interesting indicators of social outcomes for
the SII discussion because recidivism was the first social outcome to be linked to a social impact bond
(recidivism data is not available due to problems with comparability across countries – see Richardson,
2009). The standout case in this picture is the United States, where prison rates are 5 times higher than the
OECD average. Providing for prisoners is a costly process, and so innovation in crime / recidivism
prevention services will be in general demand, which may create a space for SII products. Moreover, when
prisons are over their capacity (above 100% occupancy rates – see Figure 5.4) this signals a pressing unmet
demand for these services, or even alternative services to incarceration.
64 © OECD 2015