Most people think the U.S. crime rate is rising. They're wrong.
1ft.io
Almost 80 percent of Americans, and 92 percent of Republicans, think crime has gone up. It actually fell in 2023. An expert blames a familiar culprit for the mistaken impression.

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If people aren’t panicked, they wouldn’t elect panic-pandering politicians, so there must always be a panic — crime, drugs, commies, libruls, etc.

    • forrgott@lemm.eeEnglish
      3·
      9 months ago

      I doubt the rate at which various crimes are reported is dropping enough to skew the data. How many reports are filed by businesses, for instance? There’s little reason to expect businesses would change reporting policies just because individuals are feeling disillusionment.

      The state of things is not good; that is no reason to dismiss a rare bit of positive news. At least, that’s my take.

    • shackled@lemm.eeEnglish
      1·
      9 months ago

      I think we can believe the number regarding violent crimes, especially murder, because those definitely get reported. I would think businesses also report larceny/retail theft because they have insurance implications as well. I agree that petty crimes against individuals is probably under reported. However, I would rely on the FBI data more than anything else because of length and trend of the data. Either people have continually decreased in reporting crimes since 1960s or crime has actually decreased since 1960s. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle.