White-collar crime in the shadow economy : lack of detection, investigation and conviction compared to social security fraud

Abstract

Our starting point is our database of those who annually are convicted of white-collar crime in Norway. Convicts commit financial crime amounting to 1 billion Norwegian Kroner (NOK) annually—the tip of the iceberg. Our calculations suggest that the iceberg may be more than ten times bigger than what is visible. White-collar crime competes with other kinds of financial crime for police resources. For example, white- collar crime competes with social security fraud for financial crime investi- gations, the latter receiving a lot more public scrutiny. We make a comparison with previous estimates of social security fraud in Norway. While social security fraud is estimated to cause economic damage totaling 10 billion NOK annually, white-collar crime probably causes total damage of 12 billion NOK.