Crime Rate

The crime rate has fallen steadily over the past 20 years, likely due to the aging of the Canadian population. Throughout history, teenagers and young adults have been the most crime prone. The years with the highest crime rates typically coincide with the teenage and young adult years of the baby boomer generation. Now that the generation has aged into late adulthood, the crime rate has steadily declined. Additionally, better law enforcement and use of complex technologies by law enforcement agencies have made it harder for potential criminals to commit a crime, and more so, to get away with it. Since the 1980s, the Canadian government has placed a large emphasis on community policing, which encouraged police to get out of their cars and engage with individuals on a personal level. These efforts have led to a declining crime rate in Canada for almost two decades. The decline accelerated in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic as stay-at-home orders overall movement in Canada. With the economy reopening and economic uncertainty rising, the crime rate increased in 2022. However, a favorable labor market and relatively positive economic conditions have reinforced the declining crime rate in Canada to the end of the current period.