Hollywood always make bank robberies look so easy ( with some notableexceptions ) . You do a picayune planning , shed on a Richard Nixon mask , you ’re in and out in a few minutes and then you’re able to populate the residuum of your life in opulence in some tropic Shangri-la that wo n’t extradite you .
A real - world bank line of work , however , is n’t a one - way ticket to luxury .
As economist Barry Reilly , Neil Rickman and Robert Wittexplainin a new survey , “ The counter on an modal camber robbery is , candidly , rubbish . ”
A UK banking organization expect the three to analyze the economical effectualness of adding some new security measuring to bank branches . As part of that , the guy had a piddling fun and read a look at the political economy of bank building robbery from the spoilt guys ’ perspective . Their results are scarce the glamourous kind which movies have taught us to expect .
The first job is that the typical return on a bank looting is moderately small . Over a three - twelvemonth full point , one thing or another went amiss and 1/3 of UK bank building robbers got aside with no money at all . The average catch for a successful stickup was around £ 30,000 ( or about $ 47,000 ) . Even then , about 1/5 of successful robbers were later catch , nail and convicted , and in some cases the money reclaim .
The economists did discover a few ways that would - be Dillingers could increase their gain . Their data demo that each additional appendage of a robbery crew raises the expected value of the draw by £ 9,033.20 ( ~ $ 14,216 USD ) . “ A big pack may have spent more fourth dimension on preparation and scouting , ” they write . “ In short , it may be more professional , and the with child return may reflect that . ” A large crew has one obvious drawback , though : there are more people that have to separate the loot . If the bunch divvies out the immediate payment equally , “ although the total catch goes up , the draw per person function down . ”
They also found that wadding heating plant has a positivistic effect on the take , and “ the threat of piece economic consumption in a bank raid raises the unconditional expect economic value of the looting by £ 10,300.50 [ $ 16,210 USD ] , ” on average .
No Way to Live
give the modal catch of £ 30,000 and the ordinary full - time UK employment wage of about £ 26,000 , the economist decide that typical depository financial institution robber are not set themselves up for a life of luxury . Rather , a heist “ will give him a modest life sentence - style for no more than 6 months . ” The loss to the cant is so low , they say , that it “ is not worth the money box ’ while to spend as little as £ 4,500 per cashier position at every offshoot on [ new protection features ] to dissuade [ robbery ] . ”
But that ’s just a one - meter job . What if you made a career of knocking over banks ? That introduces a different problem . If someone keep at it and hook two banks a year to conserve their income , the economic expert say , the odds of getting caught will increase . After three jobs , or a twelvemonth and a one-half , his chance of getting wear out is about one-half . One more job , and he ’s very potential in prison , which really wreak mayhem on his earning potential .
“ As a profitable occupancy , ” the report concludes , “ cant robbery leaves a quite a little to be desire . ”
