Why did the crime rate drop so much in 2009?
According to the FBI, the national homicide rate dropped 10 percent in 2009. Property crimes also dropped significantly in 2009. Crime, broadly speaking, is now at levels not seen since the early 1960s. No longer is this just a New York City miracle. It’s a national story.
Why did that happen?
Crime used to be the most ideological debate point in American politics. Liberals attributed crime’s increase in the late 1960s, 1970s and 1980s to deindustrialization and increasing class divides. Conservatives blamed lax moral standards and a judicial system too friendly to criminals.
Then crime started to drop around 1995. This happened in high-profile cities like New York and in lower profile cities across the country. Some credited the end of the crack wars, others more aggressive community policing, others the harsh sentencing regimen of the War on Drugs, and others the economic gains for African Americans in the Clinton years. After leveling off in the mid-00s crime went down again this last year.
Again, there are ideological arguments abundant. Conservatives cite looser gun laws giving law-abiding citizens the ability to defend themselves (though still gun-unfriendly cities like DC have seen major drops in crime too). And some credit a black President with steering some previously disaffected African American youth away from a life of crime (though crime has dropped among whites too).
But I think the real reason is the economy. It seems counterintuitive that a recession would cause crime to go down. After all, massive joblessness means more desperate people looking for money, right?
But the 1930s showed a similar trend – crime actually bottomed out in that decade too.
Part of the explanation may be that there just aren’t that many people to steal from – though that was always the case in poor inner city neighborhoods.
I think what’s happened is that the general economic downturn has simply lowered economic expectations to the point that fringe elements of the population don’t feel like they’re missing out on their share of the wealth. In times of national abundance the poor feel that they aren’t “getting paid” and so must do whatever is necessary to make ends meet. In comes the New Jack City culture of the 1980s and early 1990s where inner city youth sought the instant wealth that seemed universal outside the ghetto.
In 2009 there is little of the culturally-driven envy – or get-rich-quick underground economy – of the 1980s. There’s a resurgent drug culture – methamphetatimine here in Appalachia and Mexican cartel-supplied cocaine in the cities. But the massive drug gang war seems not to have accompanied it for now. The drugs are there, but the jealousy isn’t.
This is all just a theory, of course. Crime is driven by many factors. But financial expectation – more than objective class reality – is a major driver behind both property and violent crime. When the suffering is broadly felt the poor are less likely to turn to crime.
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12 Responses to “Why did the crime rate drop so much in 2009?”
Could just be because we have most of the criminally ignorant in prison now.
Good place to keep them?
The Historian David Hackett Fisher, traced both the murder and inflation rates in England for over 700 years in his book The Great Wave ( http://www.bookwormhole.net/?search_target=the+…).
He shows a strong correllation between crime and inflation. They go up and down together. High inflation, high crime, low inflation low crime. No one has explained the correlation, but it is there.
The Great depression was a time of deflation, and low crime. The prosperous 80's had high inflation and high crime
This year we have low inflation, we should expect low crime.
interguru,
Inflation largely dissipated by 1984. Yet, crime spiked dramatically after 1985. In fact, 1992 was one of the highest crime years in US history and inflation was virtually non-existent. The reason was crack.
No, I won't, I won't, I won't…. help me, God, please… help me, someone! Is there any duct tape around?
David Hackett Fischer is a first-rate writer and historian. I read his massive biography of Champlain. Not someone I ever had an interest in reading a book about, but Fischer actually made it a page-turner.
“Criminally Ignorant” is a legal term Kathy. It is also a legal definition. It is not a wise crack. The term, as well as the definition, are far beyond the ineptitude of Bohemia.
(ya see, you should’a took yer shot when ya had it.)
There are a “bazillion” variables in the crime rate and why or how it fluctuates.
It would be interesting to see some concrete research on this one – that is not biased one way or the other.
But here is one little gem you guys have come to expect from me……
Since 1995 – Church attendence steadily increased (peaking in 2001 after 9/11).
May or may not be a coincidence. But you probably already know where I stand on the matter.
Yeah, that research would be called, “Sociology”, it's science and that superstitious BS you call “church” has nothing to do with any of it.
Religion has absolutely nothing to do with the crime rate. It has just morphed from a population control mechanism into a business program.
The problem with this argument is that the highest church attendance states tend to also be the most crime-ridden. Even if you control for race the South has more crime than any other region – and far more church goers. White Southerners are far more likely to commit violent crimes than other whites. They are also far more likely to attend church than other whites.
Part of the “evangelical life cycle” may explain it – sin in a big bad way and then get saved. Knowing that the narrative of fall-and-redemption is one each person is likely to live may give license to more outrageous behavior. When you don't have a “reset” button you might take your actions as a young adult more seriously. But that's just a theory…
At least you didn't include the contemporary obesity “crisis” related nonsense. (There is no “super-sizing” of the population that is causing a related dimunition in crime due to physical incapacitation.)
Our society's aging is what likely matters most. We're less violence-prone as we leave our youth.
Attitudes toward crime have changed since the stereotypical liberal Sixties legacy (blaming society for everything and including freedom from punishment, negative judgment, or even disapproval by the public or by individuals as a PC entitlement). But this predated the aging of our society. (It changed in the 1980s, but you can't “blame” that on Reagan, who was an effect himself, not the cause of that.)
You're gay.
Oddly enough, elrod; very few of the crimes you speak of a committed BY churchgoers. Granted, there are a lot of backwoods ignorant types out there who would fight/stab/shoot people for whatever reasons in the south. They're in the north too. It's the types of crime that are different, because of the types of cultures in the north/south. I haven't done the research (yet), but I would be willing to bet that when ALL types of crime are taken into account, the south would be a bit lower. Just a hunch.
Likewise, the white-collar crime would be higher in the north.