> and crime will have declined for 27 straight years
> But criminologists differ about the cause of the continued declines. Mr. Zimring said that while better policing accounted for much of the decline in crime since 1990, it was no longer a primary driver. New York is “tiptoeing” toward a 90 percent crime decline for reasons that remain “utterly mysterious,” he said.
The "27 straight years" caught my eye, and reminded me of something I saw a good decade ago, so may I suggest something controversial?
It doesn't perfectly match 27 years ago, but this is across the whole US, not just NYC - (popular) violent video games are highly correlated with the drop in crime: http://oi25.tinypic.com/2r6ns4y.jpg
(Correlation <> causation, but I _definitely_ think it merits more investigation... does anyone else happen to know more?)
* First instinct is that the fall-off should be more gradual if it's based on people's ages, not have that sudden sharp descent. I don't put a lot of weight to this though since the 20-year gap makes it sound like the exposure has to be under a certain age (and so within a relatively small range), which would appear as a relatively sharp drop.
* Second, after noticing the graph doesn't actually look like the one I posted (which jtmarmon posted confirmation to in a google doc), I took a closer look: It claims to be using "violent crimes per 100,000 population", but instead matches this chart from wikipedia [0], which isn't scaled by population - it's using raw numbers from the UCR data tool [1]. If the gasoline line is labeled wrong as well, then there's probably no issue, but if it's labeled correctly then half the correlation for this story isn't actually a correlation. Not sure where to look for that one, though.
People know that there is a drop a drop in crime on the weekend that a big violent movie comes out.
It's also known that male participation has dropped in the labour force and in particular young males without many skills who also tend to commit crime:
Personally I think there is something in this. A big, time consuming engaging hobby appearing that young males take to with great enthusiasm appearing as games got cheaper and better.
> in particular young males without many skills who also tend to commit crime
> A big, time consuming engaging hobby appearing that young males take to with great enthusiasm appearing as games got cheaper and better.
I wasn't even thinking along those lines, my thought was more about the "violent" part of "violent video games" - that the games acted as a sort of stress release valve, helping people with their self-control when it matters.
It could do that. Or it might just give them a reason to do something else rather than hang out with other bored young men and potentially plan things.
It's also worth noting that the drop in crime has also happened in a bunch of countries around the same time.
Another thing that has happened at the same time is the rise of Hikikomori and others who stay at home with their parents and don't do a lot.
Now of course, there are phones in the hand of so many young people giving them a constant feed of engaging content. This no doubt hinders people's concentration but it also might, again, stop people comitting crimes.
I think the concept you're looking for is the one of catharsis [1].
Aristoteles used it to explain why theater was a good thing, when people were complaining that violence in dramas may cause violence in society. The global idea is that it purges it instead (people experience violence during a play, so they are less inclined to want to experience it in reality).
Interesting perspective. Yeah, video games, netflix, cheap food, weed and welfare definitely seem to keep many poor people in couch lock stupors. And maybe violent video games add some kind of aggression sink effect. Wow.
So the issue I have with people citing gentrification is: given gentrification alone (without an accompanied descrease in overall wealth inequality) wouldn’t the concentrated wealth attract crime? So any argument that cites gentrification has to show that it brings up everybody, not just the gentrifiers.
"It’s working, for now, in New York. Detroit had a little less luck with it, because there are not very many 26-year-olds earning $600,000 a year who want to live in Detroit."
It's hard to create a welfare system akin to NYC when young professionals do not want to move there.
The welfare situation down there doesn’t really seem sufficient.
The NYCHA, on the other hand, appears to be functional and provides relative security and stability for its residents, while the city provides enough work opportunity for those who can and want to work. You couldn’t write an article like this about Chicago: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/448741/new-york-city-m...
Convincing the citizens of Chicago/Illinois more taxes is a good solution would not be easy. The state of Illinois itself is bankrupt and already suffers from exorbitant taxes.
I also really want someone to study the rise in popularity of "gangsta rap" and the decrease in crime.
While listening to the great podcast "Mogul", it struck me how many people were pushed away from gangs due to the success of friends/family in the hip-hop industry.
> But criminologists differ about the cause of the continued declines. Mr. Zimring said that while better policing accounted for much of the decline in crime since 1990, it was no longer a primary driver. New York is “tiptoeing” toward a 90 percent crime decline for reasons that remain “utterly mysterious,” he said.
The "27 straight years" caught my eye, and reminded me of something I saw a good decade ago, so may I suggest something controversial?
It doesn't perfectly match 27 years ago, but this is across the whole US, not just NYC - (popular) violent video games are highly correlated with the drop in crime: http://oi25.tinypic.com/2r6ns4y.jpg
(Correlation <> causation, but I _definitely_ think it merits more investigation... does anyone else happen to know more?)