Correlation doesn’t equal causation. The most violent states in the US are mostly red states (and are also states with large cities).
The other thing all these cities have in common is that they are major population centers. All have high gang activity (also correlated with large populations). Large populations are the chief predictor of crime rates. There are also correlates with age demographics in a city. Cities that are dominated by younger demographics tend to have more crime. Older citizen populations tend to also be calmer in terms of overall crime rates.
The incentive structures that drive crime in urban areas are probably not much changed since the year this was published.
The safest cities are not a fair comparison really. They all have much smaller populations than the most dangerous ones, and in the case of many, are dominated by bedroom communities and suburbs. Smaller, more economically homogeneous populations dominate these communities.
I shared the report because it does a good job of explaining the incentive structure of urban crime. But I am pretty skeptical of Townhall’s analysis if I am being honest. Townhall has a conservative editorial stance. For a pretty apolitical examination of these trends I use this site. Crime Statistics by State and City - CityRating.com
The big standout from this page alone indicates that population size is the largest predictor of crime stats. States and cities with large population have more crime that states and cities with smaller populations.
That may be the case with some states. I’m not aware of what states where that might be occurring. I’m certainly no expert. I’m just not sure that one party or another can be easily blamed for the danger of the cities or states given that population seems to be the biggest predictor of crime rates the more people the more crime.
Comparing two states that are sort of place holders for a party, Texas (>30,000,000) and New York (slightly >19,000,000). Texas is, by every metric a much more violent place than New York. Texas crime rates are greater than the national average, whereas New York ranks much lower than the national average crime rate. Some of this is accounted for by the larger populations but not completely. Culturally this is not actually a decent apples to apples comparison.
The Northeast as a whole tends to be less violent that south or the west generally. The other typical stand-in for liberal governance is almost certainly California, which has about 10,000,000 more people than Texas, but to my eye, the crime stats of both Texas and California (for all their alleged political differences) seem almost indistinguishable.
Texas and California each have a lot of large cities.
What I would urge is that everyone whatever their politics get away from the simplistic Dems or GOP are the cause of all the problems of crime in cities or states (progressives do this same thing, but with state data because that looks worse for Red states).
Here are the three Cityrating pages I was just using for my comparisons. It seems like a useful place to go for apolitical data on crime.
Which all goes to prove what I have believed for a long time… any city with a population and/or population density above a certain threshold is a cesspool unfit for human habitation. It has long been known that when too many animals are contained in too little space, they go mad. Humans are the only animals who do this to themselves intentionally.
Where is crime more likely to happen? (Answer, denser population areas), and
What will the response be when a crime is committed?
The current state of the Democrat’s political platform has been a very soft on crime approach. That’s not a political statement, it’s a fact, well documented and oft boasted about. And sadly, to appease the party superiors, many of the blue city / state leaders have adopted a soft on crime mentality in their governance.
But where elected leaders, of any party, will allow law enforcement to enforce the law, you see less crime overall, and certainly less repeat offenders. In the current political landscape, that’s probably going to be in cities that lean red. But again, the less populated the area is, the less likely it is that you’ll see an overall increase in crime.
I think it should also be pointed out that the “most dangerous” city on this list, Birmingham, means you have a 1.7% chance of being a victim of violent crime. While not insignificant, would you put any bets on anything else with those odds? I think our country is a lot safer than media wants us to believe. The real issue is not Birmingham, for example, as a whole, but the areas therein where the odds of violence are much higher.
Are you and the rest of the country SURPRISED in any way ?? We live outside of Baltimore. over 300 homicides a year, for the past 9 years straight. AND they want to tighten the carry laws in MD. where 90% of the homicides are committed by juveniles. with stolen handguns.
Same thing with my city, which supposedly is one of the most dangerous in the state. But the reality is that only a certain part of the city is dangerous, because that’s where all the drug runners and gang members hang out. And they very rarely leave their territory. But if you don’t go into those neighborhoods after dark, your chances of being a victim of violent crime are about as close to zero as you can get. For a good majority of cities, I think that’s how it is.
Which all goes to prove what I have believed for a long time… any city with a population and/or population density above a certain threshold is a cesspool unfit for human habitation. It has long been known that when too many animals are contained in too little space, they go mad. Humans are the only animals who do this to themselves intentionally.
On the other hand, people who live in cities tend to be healthier and live longer lives than people who live rural areas, which is a counter intuitive finding.
But a little examination demonstrates why this is the case, and most of it has to do with the fact that rural populations are enormously underserved medically. There are few hospitals, fewer clinics, almost no specialists. Whereas in a city there are almost always much easier access to healthcare. People walk more in big cities, or bike because it is easier to get around that way than driving. And since the clean air and water act, city air is much better than the air you could see of the late sixties/70s/80s. Rural areas also often pretty economically depressed which is also a pretty significant correlate of lower life expectancies and poor health outcomes.
Though I, like you do like living in the country more than I do the city. There are tradeoffs.
I would also point out that resistance to “broken windows” policing hasn’t helped anyone either. I get the moral resistance to such policing (it will almost certainly always be felt by poor people more than more well off people) but the data supports that enforcing some environmental order goes a long way toward affecting people’s behavior for the better.
Living longer…in a cesspool, all my dreams come true.
Rural folks drive more because walking is impractical and counter-productive when viewed in the context of travel time and cargo capacity.
Medical facilities aren’t about health; they are all about damage repair. “Health” is mostly in the hands of the individual, albeit with some guidance from the medical industry. Even that guidance has to be evaluated (with a grain of salt) by the individual. Never doubt for a moment that they work for the insurance companies, not for you.
Economically depressed or economically ignored? And by what metrics are they judged to be generally depressed? Bear in mind that cities are, and always have been, and economic construct built for their benefit to industrial efficiency, not for the benefit of the residents. (and NO, I am not a socialist, marxist, or communist. Not even slightly.) I understand and accept the good that has come out of this system, but I also understand the consequences.
Yes! Making one’s way through life is a series of trade-offs. The tremendous material gains afforded to us through the industrial concentration of the cities comes with the trade-off of accepting the degradation of the individuals living there. I see this and I understand it, yet I am happy to participate in it for, and according to, my own benefit.
Police don’t prevent crime. They take reports AFTER a crime has been committed, and maybe (if you can identify the perp to them), they catch and prosecute bad guys. Police are not a social service agency (upon which the “broken windows” theory of policing is based on – i.e., cops can solve social problems by rigorously pursuing petty offenses), although the average cop spends a large proportion of his duty time mediating family fights.
A telling statistic would be to compare crime rates in various cities with the per capita police department expenditures. I’m pretty sure that crime is not lower in cities that spend more on policing.
Indeed. When I lived in urban areas, I regularly navigated a gauntlet of bums begging for spare change and lost all manner of stuff to thieves. When I moved to rural Colorado, I left that behind.
The first level of force for peace officers is presence. Being present has a deterrent effect that can prevent some crimes. So in that regard, the per-capita or unit-of-area uniform/visible police presence may correlate to crime all else equal
But good luck trying to figure out that first level stat let alone accounting for other more prominant variables.
Yes, the media controls the narrative to control the populace. They control how people see and perceive things. Every instance of bigotry and crime involving different ethnicities is broadcast over the media to promote distrust and anger when in reality those instances are relatively very small. It is a divide and conquer strategy. To keep people angry and focused on their differences rather than their likenesses.
