US crime figures: Why the drop?

[hack89]

Interesting article speculating why crime in America has steadily dropped since 1991.

For 20 years, crime in the US has been falling and new figures from the FBI show a sharp drop in the last two years, despite the recession. Why?

Through Democratic and Republican administrations and through booms and busts, crime has been falling since 1991.
There is little evidence the recession has influenced crime rates

Murder and robbery rates nearly halved from 1991-98, a phenomenon that has saved thousands of lives and spared many more potential victims of crime.

The pace of the reduction slowed in the late 90s but new FBI figures show the sharp drop in crime that began around 2008 continued last year, despite high unemployment.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13799616

[JI7]

1. cell phone/cams ?

[hack89]

3. That would be reason #10. nt

[JI7]

5. i get internet could be included with # 9 which is video games

which keep young people more inside the homes.

[trackfan]

2. All us kids (the baby boomers) are getting too old to do crime.

The subsequent generations haven't been as big.

[hack89]

4. Reason # 8. nt

[customerserviceguy]

8. That's my answer

It's hard to use something from The Scooter Store as a getaway car.

[pipoman]

6. A movement from 5 states with legal concealed carry

of firearms by law abiding citizens to 48 states, soon to be 49?

[louis-t]

13. Yes, it must be because of more guns.

:eyes: Jeez.

[Imajika]

15. Why not?

More guns and more freedom to carry them sure isn't causing crime to go up now is it?

[spin]

17. Some do say that more guns = less crime, but ...

there are far too many factors in the equation to state that this is a fact.

It is interesting that while the sale of firearms has skyrocketed, the violent crime rate has fallen.

USA Gun Owners Buy 14 Million Plus Guns In 2009 – More Than 21 of the Worlds Standing Armies Combined
Wednesday, January 13th, 2010 at 11:43 AM



Washington, DC --(AmmoLand.com)- Data released by the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) for the year reported 14,033,824 NICS Checks for the year of 2009, a 10 percent increase in gun purchases from the 12,709,023 reported in 2008.

So far that is roughly 14,000,000+ guns bought last year!
The total is probably more as many NICS background checks cover the purchase of more than one gun at a time by individuals.

To put it in perspective that is more guns than the combined active armies of the top 21 countries in the world.
http://www.ammoland.com/2010/01/13/gun-owners-buy-14-million-plus-guns-in-2009/

If more guns caused more crime it would seen logical that the 110,000,000 + firearms sold between November of 1998 and December of 2009 would have caused the violent crime rate to increase.

Perhaps, despite what the Brady Campaign says, more guns does not equal more crime.

[pipoman]

18. Yeah,

preposterous huh? Especially when there are so many other, more reasonable possibilities, like increased availability of legal abortion, lead in petrol, and video games.

:eyes: indeed

[Marblehead]

7. dollar menu

[libodem]

9. Do you think locking up 5% of the population has worked?

The secret Bush Justice round-ups of gang bangers, fugitives, and illegals as military recruits? Holder knows how much dope to keep in the gettos so nobody riots? We really a good and decent nation, our leaders are Capitolist pigs?




Won'tet me edit a to are. Oh well.

[woo me with science]

10. WTF #3?

3. Smarter policing helped the border city of Laredo in Texas to reduce car theft by 40% last year. Police spokesman Joe Baeza says they introduced a scheme whereby motorists could register their car number plates into a police database and this empowered patrol cars to stop these cars if they were spotted late at night, to verify the owners. Mr Baeza adds that they also targeted car theft networks, educated the community about prevention and promoted anti-theft devices.

[bigwillq]

11. Obamacare

:shrug:

:rofl:

[lunatica]

12. In my case I have an explanation that might fly

The Window on the driver's side of my car was smashed in and the glove compartment was left open as someone obviously went through it. They didn't find anything and I'm left with a broken window which I can't fix. So I taped it up with plastic. No one has torn the plastic to get anything and I think it's because they think nothing could possibly be in such a piece of shit car.

LOL!

[FreeJoe]

14. I had a similar experience

I went on a 3 day outing with a big group. We all parked in what was believed to be a safe parking lot behind an office building and took a chartered bus to our location. We got back Monday morning around 5:00 AM. It was dark and rainy. Everyone's car had their window smashed and their stereo stolen. Everyone's except mine. I drove a beat up old hatchback with a pathetic radio. My car was just fine.

[ej510]

16. Or cooking the books.