Help reduce the financial and human cost of domestic violence by raising awareness and taking action to address the impact of domestic violenece in your work place.
The Cost of Domestic Violence: Up-date 2009 Sylvia Walby
November 2009
While domestic violence is terrible enough in its own right to justify policy interventions, the scale of the costs aids the prioritisation of relevant policies. This report up-dates The Cost of Domestic Violence by Sylvia Walby published by the Women and Equality Unit, Department of Trade and Industry in 2004 , from the year 2001 to 2008 .
There are several reasons for changes to the estimates: a decrease in the rate of domestic violence ; greater use of public services by victims of domestic violence, as a result of their development; and technical adjustments due to inflation and to growth in GDP
There has been a reduction in the cost of lost economic output due to the decrease in the rate of domestic violence. The cost of the lost economic output is restricted only to time off work due to injuries sustained as a result of domestic violence. While there are additional losses to productivity as a result of stress and reduced performance, such costs are additional to those included in this report.
The decrease in domestic violence has been achieved in part by the development of and increased utilisation of public services. For example, there are higher rates of reporting of domestic violence to the police and other services. This means that while the rate of domestic violence has been falling, the use and costs of public services have not declined. Indeed, as compared with 2001 these costs for 2008 are higher as a result of inflation.
The costs for business and the wider society of domestic violence have declined as a result of the fall in the rate of domestic violence, due to better public services. The investment in public services to reduce domestic violence has been cost effective for the country as a whole, reducing the extent of lost economic output as well as the human and emotional costs.
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