Making the Case for Domestic Violence Prevention Through the Lens of Cost-Benefit
A Manual for Domestic Violence Prevention Practitioners
(and the State and Local Policy-Makers They Present to)
National Data On Intimate Partner Violence
In 2003, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) published a report, Costs of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women in the United States, that began to estimate the national costs of intimate partner violence against women ages 18 and older, including the costs of intimate partner violence-related injuries, costs of lost productivity resulting from intimate partner violence, and the economic costs of lives lost to intimate partner violence homicide, all of which contribute significantly to the economic burden of this intimate partner violence. (Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC). Costs of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women in the United States. Atlanta, Georgia, 2003) This report presents annual data about IPV and its costs, generalized from data about the incidence of intimate partner violence in a given year (1995) and the costs associated with those victimizations. (Implications for Advocacy and Training: An Analysis of Costs of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women in the United States, distributed by the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence (NRCDV), 2003.) The National Violence Against Women Survey (NVAWS) was the first large-scale survey to collect information about injuries IPV victims sustained, the medical and mental health care services victims used, and the time victims lost from paid work and household chores. (Ibid.)
While these statistics can be used to help make the case for domestic violence prevention, "the cost figures contained in the report are not comprehensive and should not be used for benefit-cost ratios in analyses of interventions to prevent IPV. They can be used to demonstrate the economic magnitude of IPV and to evaluate the impact of IPV on a specific sub-sector of the economy, specifically consumption of medical resources." (Ibid.) (underlining ours)
We recommend reading the full report for more about the above-quoted information, available at: http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/pub-res/ipv_cost/IPVBook-Final-Feb18.pdf.
Summary of National Data: Costs of Intimate Partner Violence
The costs of intimate partner rape, physical assault, and stalking exceed $5.8 billion each year, nearly $4.1 billion of which is for direct medical and mental health care services.
U.S. women lose nearly 8.0 million days of paid work each year because of violence perpetrated against them by current or former husbands, cohabitants, dates, and boyfriends. This is the equivalent of 32,114 full-time jobs each year. An additional 5.6 million days are lost from household chores.
The total costs of intimate partner violence (IPV) include nearly $0.9 billion in lost productivity from paid work and household chores for victims of nonfatal IPV and $0.9 billion in lifetime earnings lost by victims of IPV homicide.
The largest component of IPV-related costs is health care, which accounts for more than two-thirds of the total costs. The mean medical care cost per incident of IPV physical assault is $548. The mean medical care cost per physical assault among victims who actually receive treatment is $2,665.
As with IPV rape, private or group insurance pays for nearly half of medical care costs for IPV physical assaults; victims pay more than one-quarter of the costs.
The estimated total health care costs of IPV each year, including medical and mental health care services, is nearly $4.1 billion.
In summary, nearly 5.3 million intimate partner victimizations occur among U.S. women ages 18 and older each year. This violence results in nearly 2.0 million injuries and nearly 1,300 deaths. Of the IPV injuries, more than 555,000 require medical attention, and more than 145,000 are serious enough to warrant hospitalization for one or more nights. IPV also results in more than 18.5 million mental health care visits each year. Add to that the 13.6 million days of lost productivity from paid work and household chores among IPV survivors and the value of IPV murder victims’ expected lifetime earnings, and it is clear to see that intimate partner violence against women places a significant burden on society.
Costs of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women in the United States, Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, GA, 2003, p. 19.