Comment by mmooss
Democracies are overwhelmingly the most efficient governments. Look at long-standing democracies and autocracies - which are the most efficient and effective? The least corrupt?
Autocracies are like communist centrally-planned economies. If the autocrat isn't all-knowing and all-good, they can't possibly know enough to run things - or even to make enough decisions to avoid being a bottleneck. One of the great advantages of democracies is that the people affected have power - they have a seat at the table. They know what's going on and what they need. If you want to plan flood relief for a town in Mississippi, ask the people there what the problems are and what they need. If you want to regulate software development, developers get input.
That goes for social, political, financial, economic, foreign affairs, and all other policy.
Regarding crime, the autocrat and servants commit plenty of that. Generally, thieves don't break down your door in the middle of the night, kidnap you, and imprison and torture you for years without trial - or just seize all your assets and prevent you from working. Also, what source do you have on crime levels in autocracies - where could reliable information come from? And as another commenter said, I don't see a correlation between crime and democracy.
(Singapore's very unusual nature makes it a poor example.)
There have been a few autocratic-esque governments that have gotten around the dictator information problem by basically implementing a free-ish market by fiat.
This is how much of UAE and to the extent Singapore is one, does it.
The dictator will basically let the free market operate and then interfere a few percent off the top of that. They are not torturing enough people to destroy their economy.