The curious case of the fall in crime

[grumpy]

Crime is plunging in the rich world. To keep it down, governments should focus on prevention, not punishment

IN THE 1990s John DiIulio, a conservative American academic, argued that a new breed of “superpredators”, “kids that have absolutely no respect for human life and no sense of the future”, would terrorise Americans almost indefinitely. He was not alone. Experts were convinced that crime would keep rising. Law-abiding citizens would retreat to gated communities, patrolled by security guards. Politicians and police chiefs could do little except bluster and try to fiddle the statistics.

Mr DiIulio later recanted and it is clear that the pessimists were wrong. Even as he wrote, America’s crime wave was breaking. Its cities have become vastly safer, and the rest of the developed world has followed. From Japan to Estonia, property and people are now safer than at almost any time since the 1970s (see article). Confounding expectations, the recession has not interrupted the downward trend. Even as America furiously debates the shooting of Trayvon Martin (see article), new data show that the homicide rate for young Americans is at a 30-year low.

Some crimes have all but died out. Last year there were just 69 armed robberies of banks, building societies and post offices in England and Wales, compared with 500 a year in the 1990s. In 1990 some 147,000 cars were stolen in New York. Last year fewer than 10,000 were. In the Netherlands and Switzerland street dealers and hustlers have been driven out of city centres; addicts there are now elderly men, often alcoholics, living in state hostels. In countries such as Lithuania and Poland the gangsters who trafficked people and drugs in the 1990s have moved into less violent activities such as fraud.

economist.com/news/leaders/2 … ention-not

[woger]

I read an article a while back and the author linked the fall in crime in the US to the reduced usage of lead paint in inner citys, I’ll try to find it.

[jmc]

@woger

I read an article a while back and the author linked the fall in crime in the US to the reduced usage of lead paint in inner citys, I’ll try to find it.

Lead paint had nothing to do with it. Around here it was three strikes and bunch of Propositions that tightened up sentencing that seemed to really break the back of petty crime by the mid 90’s. The crack epidemic of the mid 80’s to mid 90’s seemed to have also made a big dent in the most problematic demographic. Street crime changed radically between the mid 80’s and the mid 90s’. It mainly disappeared in most neighborhoods. Anyone who had experienced places like NYC or LA in the early / mid 80s will know just how sketchy and dangerous most US cities were at the time. Muggings were a just a part of daily life back then. Its very different nowadays.

Of course we will always have Oakland…

[Coles2]

The evidence is certainly pointing at lead in petrol. Here’s a good article on it.

[yoganmahew]

@Mantissa

@Coles2

The evidence is certainly pointing at lead in petrol. Here’s a good article on it.

Interesting read. The 23-year lag sounds suspiciously long though, no?

I guess it depends on what the likely age of violent criminals was?

It’s interesting to tie in to the madness that resulted from lead solder in that expedition that went looking for the NorthWest passage. Clearly lead has an effect on adults, but the studies I vaguely remember seemed to indicate that its effects started in the womb - that there were measurable effects from atmospheric lead even before birth.

[HNWI]

@jmc

Lead paint had nothing to do with it. Around here it was three strikes and bunch of Propositions that tightened up sentencing that seemed to really break the back of petty crime by the mid 90’s.

Agreed. Starting with Giuliani’s “zero tolerance” policy, the USA locked up all the petty criminals for very long sentences effectively removing them from society and their ability to commit more serious crimes.

The downside is that the USA now has a bigger gulag system than the Soviet Union, and people committing victimless crimes like “unauthorised copying” have been swept up into the system as well.

[tulip]

@HNWI

@jmc

Lead paint had nothing to do with it. Around here it was three strikes and bunch of Propositions that tightened up sentencing that seemed to really break the back of petty crime by the mid 90’s.

Agreed. Starting with Giuliani’s “zero tolerance” policy, the USA locked up all the petty criminals for very long sentences effectively removing them from society and their ability to commit more serious crimes.

The downside is that the USA now has a bigger gulag system than the Soviet Union, and people committing victimless crimes like “unauthorised copying” have been swept up into the system as well.

You could make that case if it was only in the US were the drop occurred but it’s everywhere so zero tolerance doesn’t explain the drop in Estonia or Japan. The decrease in lead poisoning would seem more plausible.

[woger]

Yes, it was lead petrol not paint.

[Ardillaun]

@tulip

You could make that case if it was only in the US were the drop occurred but it’s everywhere so zero tolerance doesn’t explain the drop in Estonia or Japan. The decrease in lead poisoning would seem more plausible.

The article quoted by the OP has a few suggestions:

There is no single cause of the decline; rather, several have coincided. Western societies are growing older, and most crimes are committed by young men. Policing has improved greatly in recent decades, especially in big cities such as New York and London, with forces using computers to analyse the incidence of crime; in some parts of Manhattan this helped to reduce the robbery rate by over 95%. The epidemics of crack cocaine and heroin appear to have burnt out.

The biggest factor may be simply that security measures have improved. Car immobilisers have killed joyriding; bulletproof screens, security guards and marked money have all but done for bank robbery. Alarms and DNA databases have increased the chance a burglar will be caught. At the same time, the rewards for burglary have fallen because electronic gizmos are so cheap. Even small shops now invest in CCTV cameras and security tags. Some crimes now look very risky—and that matters because, as every survey of criminals shows, the main deterrent to crime is the fear of being caught.

Many conservatives will think this list omits the main reason crime has declined: the far harsher prison sentences introduced on both sides of the Atlantic over the past two decades. One in every hundred American adults is now in prison. This has obviously had some effect—a young man in prison cannot steal your car—but if tough prison sentences were the cause, crime would not be falling in the Netherlands and Germany, which have reduced their prison populations. New York’s prison population has fallen by a quarter since 1999, yet its crime rate has dropped faster than that of many other cities.

[Coles2]

I don’t buy the zero tolerance/‘three strikes’ argument. I would imagine that having the father in prison is far more likely to result in the child also committing crime.

Here’s a good read on the introduction of Leaded Gasoline.

[yoganmahew]

@Coles2

I don’t buy the zero tolerance/‘three strikes’ argument. I would imagine that having the father in prison is far more likely to result in the child also committing crime.

Here’s a good read on the introduction of Leaded Gasoline.

Guess which other fuckup Midgely was involved in?

Think ozone and fridges…

[Mossy_Heneberry]

@Coles2

I don’t buy the zero tolerance/‘three strikes’ argument.

Even for violent crimes?

I would imagine that having the father in prison is far more likely to result in the child also committing crime.

How come?

[the_dude]

@Coles2

I don’t buy the zero tolerance/‘three strikes’ argument. I would imagine that having the father in prison is far more likely to result in the child also committing crime.

It has to make a difference, think of the case of Guido Nasi, the scumbag who attacked him had over 40 previous convictions before he ended poor Guidos life

and thats not a one off, the country if full of scum slowly accumulating a long list of “minor” convictions, they only get sent down when they do some life changing damage to some poor soul, and even then our tard judges give out joke sentences

if these people are off the streets it must have an effect on crime, if all the junkies in Dublin were locked up tomorrow it would be a very different city

[blanchguy]

@the dude

It has to make a difference, think of the case of Guido Nasi, the scumbag who attacked him had over 40 previous convictions before he ended poor Guidos life

and thats not a one off, the country if full of scum slowly accumulating a long list of “minor” convictions, they only get sent down when they do some life changing damage to some poor soul, and even then our tard judges give out joke sentences

if these people are off the streets it must have an effect on crime, if all the junkies in Dublin were locked up tomorrow it would be a very different city

The guy who attacked Guido Nasi assaulted my father a couple of months before Guido, during the day, while my father was working. My father went to the guards, with the guy’s name and was told “It’s your word against his really…”.

[Mossy_Heneberry]

@Barney Gumble

Mossy, in cases where the evidence points quite strongly towards a different conclusion,

What evidence?

it’s safe and socially acceptable to leave behind the right-wing boilerplate that seems to inform your every opinion.

As oppose to your leftwing do gooder scumbagism?

Why don’t you answer my questions?

[Coles2]

@the dude

@Coles2

I don’t buy the zero tolerance/‘three strikes’ argument. I would imagine that having the father in prison is far more likely to result in the child also committing crime.

It has to make a difference, think of the case of Guido Nasi, the scumbag who attacked him had over 40 previous convictions before he ended poor Guidos life

and thats not a one off, the country if full of scum slowly accumulating a long list of “minor” convictions, they only get sent down when they do some life changing damage to some poor soul, and even then our tard judges give out joke sentences

if these people are off the streets it must have an effect on crime, if all the junkies in Dublin were locked up tomorrow it would be a very different city

No doubt a lot of crime is caused by drug addicts attempting to feed their habit, but I doubt if it’s significant in the final figures. Mostly opportunist stuff like handbags or phones, or maybe some burglaries and car theft. I don’t have figures for the Republic, but in the North the total cost of property crime against the individual (muggings, house burglary, theft, car robberies etc) was only £60 million in 2006/7. The amount that this crime was worth to the criminals (junkies?) was probably less than 20% of this. About £10 million per annum? Seems like a pittance when you compare it to the cost of responding to the crime, or indeed to white collar fraud.

Jailing a drug addict removes the problem temporarily, but the social and financial cost in the long term doesn’t make sense. Better to intensively treat the addiction or, failing that, find ways to mitigate the costs.

What would happen if you jail the drug dealers? More dealers fill the void. Jail the burglars for life? Their kids grow up with no father.

[Coles2]

According to the American Correctional Association, up to 50% of incarcerated juveniles have a parent who is or has been incarcerated.

[grumpy]

I remember listening to Marion Overpaid a few years ago interviewing a retired guard. His sad view was that you could walk around Holles St and predict the babies who would be in the children’s court in 10 years due to the chaotic/fucked up life of the parents.

But heresay anyway

Aside from that I think it’s a whole plethora of things. Connectivity (watch the Sweeney communicate), surveillance, security and maybe even some education.

[Mossy_Heneberry]

@Barney Gumble

The evidence cited in the Mother Jones article? Or did you miss it? Have a look on the previous page. I strategically bolded some bits to emphasise some statements made in an excerpt.

You call that evidence?

Actually I think you’ll find on average my views are centrist, or perhaps centre-right - but here’s the thing: I decide each issue on its merits. I don’t get every one of my beliefs from the box marked ‘left-wing’ or the box marked ‘right-wing’. You might like to try something similar?

And you don’t think calling yourself centrist(oooh, aren’t you great and good!) is box ticking?

[Mossy_Heneberry]

@Barney Gumble

Yes. Do you have evidence to support your (standard right-wing) view? Is it stronger evidence than the correlations found internationally in the studies of lead use in petrol?

No it doesn’t. And to treat people as automatons???

Correlation does not imply causation.

I know exactly what your position will be on an issue before I read your posts. I find it amusing, but you should probably find that a little bit worrying.

Do you? And I know exactly your positon too. A centrist, so called do gooder,