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Subscribe to RSSAmericans, take solace: While your chances of landing a job these days might not be great, you’re also less likely to be murdered, or robbed or to have your car stolen.
The rate of major crimes in the U.S. continues to drop – even during the recent recession and its aftermath – and crime experts aren’t sure why.
"I am surprised by the overall decline in both violent and property crime during and since the recent recession. I’ve studied crime trends in relation to economic conditions for some time, and the 2008-09 recession is the first time since WW II that crime rates have not risen during a substantial downturn in the economy,” says Richard Rosenfeld, a professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and past president of the American Society of Criminology.
“What’s pushing it down is the mystery meat in the recipe of recent years,” says Franklin Zimring, a criminologist and UC Berkeley law professor who has written several books on crime-related topics.
According to recently released FBI crime statistics, the number of violent crimes -- murder and non-negligent homicide, forcible rape, robbery and aggravated assault -- reported in the first six months of 2011 declined 6.4 percent compared with the first six months of 2010. The number of property crimes (burglary, larceny-theft and motor vehicle theft) decreased 3.7 percent for the same time frame.
The report is based on information from more than 12,500 law enforcement agencies and shows the continuation of a downward trend in crime that began in 2008.
It’s also part of a broader, longer-term trend: Between 1991 and 2010, the homicide rate fell 51 percent and property crimes dropped 64 percent. Crime rates decreased significantly during the 1990s before flattening out at the start of the new century.
The statistical trend is puzzling and not easily explained.
More offenders were being put behind bars and the U.S. economy boomed in the 1990s, so maybe that had something to do with the decline, Zimring notes. But then, how do you explain the decline in the past three or so years, when incarceration rates have flattened out and the economy has gone to hell?
“By both the left- and right-wing leading indicators we should be in a lot of trouble – except (we’re) not,” Zimring says. “Everything we thought we knew are deeply challenged by events by the last three years.”
Rosenfeld thinks smarter policing has contributed in many places (including New York and Los Angeles). But he says it cannot explain the entire decline, since in most places policing is much the same as it was 10 years ago.
And tougher sentencing isn’t the answer either, since national imprisonment rates are also on the decline, albeit modestly.
“One overlooked economic factor is inflation, or rather the very low levels of inflation during the past few years,” Rosenfeld wrote in an email to msnbc.com. “High rates of inflation are connected with high crime rates, so when inflation drops we should expect corresponding declines in crime, in the first instance property crime.”
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Abortion.
Nobody wants to talk about it, but Roe V. Wade is the unexpected reason why crime hasn't risen despite a bad economy. The old model of expecting crime to rise with hard times doesn't apply when you keep high-risk children from ever being born. Unwanted children, by parents who don't want them, are the primary production apparatus for a criminal base. Remove unwanted kids - you remove the criminal mayhem 20-40 years down the road.
I'm a liberal and don't buy this argument.
I rank this right up there with "the number one cause of divorce is marriage".
Manny sorta sounds like a alcoholic or a drug user. Such nonsense, Manny.
Roe v. Wade???
Next, Manny or some neo-nut will say somethin' stooopid(sic) like... "Rich people never steal or commit crimes!"
I'm sorry, but Manny is hardly the first one to attribute the dropping crime rate to the falling number of poor young men, due to contraception and abortion. And while rich men and women certainly do commit violent crimes, poor young males are much more likely to do so.
A related factor is probably much more important...namely, the aging population, who are much less likely to be violent criminals.
In other words, the people that would keep a population from aging - by being young - don't exist because they were never born. Because of more effective birth control and... abortion.
I really don't understand why people find this argument offensive. Is there such a thing as an offensive argument? Being offended by the product of reason? Sounds irrational. Sounds life a belief system. Sounds like religion.
Crime spikes aren't caused by race, laziness or unwanted babies. Crime spikes are caused by poverty.
When people can eat and sleep in a warm, dry place, we tend not to commit more crimes.
Yes, Bean. It is "arms." A blanket statement. Arms. Anything I can afford to buy. And people can carry them. Read the dicta in the Dred Scott decision. The Court was ruled as it did for fear of free blacks going about armed like everyone else. The dicta in Roe cited the RKBA as an individual right, and not limited by the militia clause.
To be consistent, those who point to the militia clause as limiting the individual RKBA need to look at the limiting clause in the 1st Amendment:
Note that "and" not "or" connects the right to petition. So free speech is only constitutional if it is used to petition the government for redress. A free press is only protected if it petitions for redress. The right to assemble is only for the purpose of petitioning the government for redress of grievances. I suppose you could argue that it applies only to the freedom to assemble, since it is joined closest to that clause.
William Rawle wrote, in his book A View On the Constitution, 1829, and which was used as the text on the Constitution at the US Military Academy, :
The prohibition is general. No clause in the constitution could by any rule of construction be conceived to give congress a power to disarm the people. Such a flagitious attempt could only be made under some general pretence by a state legislature. But if in any blind pursuit of inordinate power, either should attempt it, this amendment may be appealed to as a restraint on both.
It seems when your paid to analyse things, simple answers to complex questions are difficult to espouse as a primary reason. From experience on the street I would say it is many things, but the biggest has to be Cell phones. Almost everyone has one. Victims and witnesses are now able to call in as things happen. This shortens response times and creates a paranoia in the criminals minds. If this one thing was taken away today, tomorrow would see crime rates jump.
Simple the numbers reported for workers is politicaly inflated ! the unemployed men are home and have guns. they can't afford to buy gas to go anywhere so their cars can't get stolen. Can't drive a car when the gas tank is empty ! Are all reporters and News Journalist as stupid as their questions? A New Low in American Journalism.
Hey, Marcel...That's like sayin' crime is racially movtivated b/c the wing-nut press refuses to report white-on-white crimes, since they're too lazy to go to the rural or vanilla 'hoods! Food for thought?
HELLOoo, Marcel?
Question:
Why is there an arrogant, presumptive, and accusatory war on the poor, but never, ever on the rich? Excluding OWS!
(Rich folks never commit crimes...?)
with an ageing population crime will go down and nobody should be surprised by this.