City Murder Rates

[SIGSEGV]

Alright, time for a 2022 comparison. Most of the numbers come from https://www.ahdatalytics.com/dashboa...er-comparison/ except for Jackson for which I used a local news source. I omitted places where I know that the jurisdiction of the police department doesn't match city boundaries (e.g. Miami, Las Vegas). I used 2020 census populations for all cities since the estimates are probably bullshit for '21 and '22. If the data was not from Dec 31 (only a few cases), I annualized it . Quoted errors assume Poisson statistics on the counts and moreover that the Poisson is approximately a Gaussian (in other words, I just used the square root of the count).

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NORTHEAST
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Baltimore         55.32 +/- 3.07      (2021: 57.54 +/- 3.13) 
Boston            6.07 +/- 0.95       (2021: 5.92 +/- 0.94) 
Buffalo           24.43 +/- 2.96      (2021: 24.07 +/- 2.94) 
New York          4.94 +/- 0.24       (2021: 5.54 +/- 0.25) 
Newark            16.05 +/- 2.27      (2021: 19.26 +/- 2.49) 
Philadelphia      31.43 +/- 1.40      (2021: 34.67 +/- 1.47) 
Pittsburgh        23.43 +/- 2.78      (2021: 17.49 +/- 2.40) 
Providence        4.79 +/- 1.57       (2021: 12.05 +/- 2.51) 
Rochester         35.96 +/- 4.13      (2021: 39.75 +/- 4.34) 
Syracuse          12.11 +/- 2.85      (2021: 19.51 +/- 3.62) 
Washington        29.44 +/- 2.07      (2021: 32.78 +/- 2.18) 


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MIDWEST
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Akron             22.95 +/- 3.32      (2021: 21.53 +/- 3.36) 
Chicago           25.31 +/- 0.96      (2021: 29.27 +/- 1.03) 
Cincinnati        26.67 +/- 2.89      (2021: 30.07 +/- 3.12) 
Cleveland         41.33 +/- 3.33      (2021: 45.62 +/- 3.50) 
Columbus          15.46 +/- 1.31      (2021: 22.52 +/- 1.58) 
Detroit           48.17 +/- 2.74      (2021: 48.04 +/- 2.74) 
Fort Wayne        7.58 +/- 1.69       (2021: 15.16 +/- 2.40) 
Indianapolis      25.46 +/- 1.69      (2021: 30.53 +/- 1.85) 
Kansas City       33.26 +/- 2.56      (2021: 30.90 +/- 2.47) 
Lincoln           3.78 +/- 1.14       (2021: 2.75 +/- 0.97) 
Madison           2.48 +/- 0.83       (2021: 2.96 +/- 1.05) 
Milwaukee         37.07 +/- 2.53      (2021: 33.44 +/- 2.41) 
Minneapolis       19.30 +/- 2.12      (2021: 22.10 +/- 2.27) 
Omaha             5.97 +/- 1.11       (2021: 6.58 +/- 1.16) 
St Louis          65.65 +/- 4.67      (2021: 66.32 +/- 4.69) 
Toledo            23.69 +/- 2.95      (2021: 26.21 +/- 3.11) 
Wichita           7.55 +/- 1.38       (2021: 11.82 +/- 1.72) 


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SOUTH
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Atlanta           34.09 +/- 2.61      (2021: 31.88 +/- 2.53) 
Austin            7.07 +/- 0.86       (2021: 8.32 +/- 0.93) 
Birmingham        67.50 +/- 5.77      (2021: 58.29 +/- 5.39) 
Charleston        5.99 +/- 2.00       (2021: 10.65 +/- 2.66) 
Charlotte         12.58 +/- 1.20      (2021: 11.09 +/- 1.13) 
Dallas            16.41 +/- 1.12      (2021: 17.02 +/- 1.14) 
Durham            16.23 +/- 2.39      (2021: 17.28 +/- 2.47) 
Fort Worth        10.99 +/- 1.09      (2021: 12.84 +/- 1.18) 
Greensboro        13.71 +/- 2.14      (2021: 17.72 +/- 2.43) 
Houston           17.83 +/- 0.88      (2021: 18.83 +/- 0.90) 
Jacksonville      13.27 +/- 1.18      (2021: 11.79 +/- 1.11) 
Lexington         13.64 +/- 2.06      (2021: 11.47 +/- 1.89) 
Little Rock       39.98 +/- 4.44      (2021: 32.08 +/- 3.98) 
Louisville        41.36 +/- 3.27      (2021: 44.97 +/- 3.41) 
Memphis           45.49 +/- 2.68      (2021: 51.18 +/- 2.84) 
Nashville         15.37 +/- 1.49      (2021: 14.65 +/- 1.46) 
New Orleans       69.01 +/- 4.24      (2021: 56.77 +/- 3.85) 
Oklahoma City     10.43 +/- 1.24      (2021: 12.04 +/- 1.33) 
Orlando           13.01 +/- 2.06      (2021: 10.08 +/- 1.81) 
Raleigh           9.19 +/- 1.40       (2021: 7.06 +/- 1.23) 
Richmond          25.15 +/- 3.33      (2021: 39.72 +/- 4.19)
Savannah          21.65 +/- 3.83      (2021: 23.01 +/- 3.95) 
Shreveport        25.05 +/- 3.65      (2021: 44.24 +/- 4.86) 
Tampa             12.47 +/- 1.80      (2021: 11.17 +/- 1.70) 
Tulsa             18.16 +/- 2.10      (2021: 17.19 +/- 2.04) 
Virginia Beach    5.01 +/- 1.04       (2021: 3.26 +/- 0.84) 
Winston-Salem     13.14 +/- 2.19      (2021: 12.82 +/- 2.27) 


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WEST 
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Albuquerque       21.26 +/- 1.94      (2021: 19.48 +/- 1.86) 
Aurora            13.16 +/- 1.83      (2021: 10.87 +/- 1.68) 
Colorado Springs  9.60 +/- 1.42       (2021: 6.26 +/- 1.14) 
Denver            12.30 +/- 1.31      (2021: 13.42 +/- 1.37) 
El Paso           4.12 +/- 0.78       (2021: 5.75 +/- 0.92) 
Fresno            11.07 +/- 1.43      (2021: 13.65 +/- 1.59) 
Honolulu          6.84 +/- 1.40       (2021: 5.13 +/- 1.21) 
Long Beach        7.71 +/- 1.29       (2021: 8.36 +/- 1.34) 
Los Angeles       9.80 +/- 0.50       (2021: 10.31 +/- 0.51) 
Oakland           27.23 +/- 2.49      (2021: 30.41 +/- 2.63) 
Phoenix           13.87 +/- 0.93      (2021: 12.31 +/- 0.88) 
Portland          14.87 +/- 1.51      (2021: 13.49 +/- 1.44) 
Sacramento        10.29 +/- 1.40      (2021: 11.05 +/- 1.45) 
Salt Lake City    7.51 +/- 1.94       (2021: 9.01 +/- 2.12) 
San Antonio       16.10 +/- 1.06      (2021: 11.22 +/- 0.88) 
San Diego         3.68 +/- 0.51       (2021: 4.11 +/- 0.54) 
San Francisco     6.41 +/- 0.86       (2021: 6.41 +/- 0.86) 
San Jose          3.45 +/- 0.58       (2021: 3.06 +/- 0.55) 
Seattle           7.06 +/- 0.98       (2021: 5.70 +/- 0.88) 
Spokane           6.99 +/- 1.75       (2021: 6.55 +/- 1.69) 
Stockton          15.33 +/- 2.09      (2021: 11.22 +/- 1.87) 
Tucson            11.61 +/- 1.46      (2021: 15.30 +/- 1.68)

Impressive decreases in places like Columbus, Providence, Fort Wayne, Richmond, and Charleston. Largest increase is... San Antonio? But I suppose this is probably due to 53 migrants found dead in a truck, which totally violates my Poisson error model. Pittsburgh also jumps out at me.

[homebucket]

Looks like the West Coast has the lowest murder rates in the nation. Nice to see some improvement with Oakland but still unacceptably high. Disappointed to see SF remain the same and Stockton and San Jose get worse though.

[Steely Dan]

once again, the stark north/south divide in homicide rates in bos-wash always stands out to me.

Boston: 6.1 per 100K
Providence: 4.8 per 100K
NYC: 4.9 per 100K

Philly: 31.4 per 100K
Baltimore: 55.3 per 100K
DC: 29.4 per 100K

[Boisebro]

Alright, time for a 2022 comparison. Most of the numbers come from https://www.ahdatalytics.com/dashboa...er-comparison/ except for Jackson for which I used a local news source. I omitted places where I know that the jurisdiction of the police department doesn't match city boundaries (e.g. Miami, Las Vegas). I used 2020 census populations for all cities since the estimates are probably bullshit for '21 and '22. If the data was not from Dec 31 (only a few cases), I annualized it . Quoted errors assume Poisson statistics on the counts and moreover that the Poisson is approximately a Gaussian (in other words, I just used the square root of the count).

thanks for sharing this link. it looks like Boise's rate is fairly consistent at under 2 per 100k over the last five years (https://www.ahdatalytics.com/dashboa...er-comparison/). local perception is that the crime rate overall is trending higher, but with the population growth, it's actually going down, at least within Boise itself.

[Smuttynose1]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

once again, the stark north/south divide in homicide rates in bos-wash always stands out to me.

Boston: 6.1 per 100K
Providence: 4.8 per 100K
NYC: 4.9 per 100K

Philly: 31.4 per 100K
Baltimore: 55.3 per 100K
DC: 29.4 per 100K

Washington DC especially has never made sense to me. The last time I looked at the socio-economic stats, DC was the best educated major city with the lowest poverty rate in the Northeast -- better than NYC or Boston. And it is also rapidly gentrifying which has played a role in the murder rate declines that NYC, Boston, and many other cities have experienced. It's weird that it's murder rate is still so damn high.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by Smuttynose1

Washington DC especially has never made sense to me. The last time I looked at the socio-economic stats, DC was the best educated major city with the lowest poverty rate in the Northeast -- better than NYC or Boston. And it is also rapidly gentrifying which has played a role in the murder rate declines that NYC, Boston, and many other cities have experienced. It's weird that it's murder rate is still so damn high.

It's probably similar to the SF-Oakland phenomenon. If Oakland was within SF's city limits, then we would have the same issue. It's likely due to bad neighborhoods (East Oakland and West Oakland) that disproportionately commit the majority of the murders.

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by Smuttynose1

Washington DC especially has never made sense to me. The last time I looked at the socio-economic stats, DC was the best educated major city with the lowest poverty rate in the Northeast -- better than NYC or Boston. And it is also rapidly gentrifying which has played a role in the murder rate declines that NYC, Boston, and many other cities have experienced. It's weird that it's murder rate is still so damn high.

Well in the early nineties, Washington DC had murder rates exceeding New Orleans and St. Louis, nearly triple what it has now. So, much improved I guess?

Here's an interesting chart from https://jasher.substack.com/p/new-or...ations-highest

[BG918]

For as much new development and improvement throughout Washington DC it still has a shamefully high murder and violent crime rate. Especially being the capital of the wealthiest and most powerful nation on Earth.

But at the same time it makes sense considering several U.S. cities are some of the most dangerous in the world when looking at crime/murder rates. Not a lot of difference between Tijuana, Juarez and Caracas and St Louis, Baltimore and New Orleans.

[TempleGuy1000]

The elephant in the room is that the US isn't mono-cultured like a majority of the world. There is a much wider variance between communities than most countries.


the other elephant in the room is the recent "abolitionist" "civil rights reform". I will let you guys be the judge of what to make of the data

[DirectionNorth]

Originally Posted by TempleGuy1000

The elephant in the room is that the US isn't mono-cultured like a majority of the world. There is a much wider variance between communities than most countries.


the other elephant in the room is the recent "abolitionist" "civil rights reform". I will let you guys be the judge of what to make of the data

Nonsense. Here in Toronto, a city of 2.9 million and one of the most multicultural cities in the world, there were just 70 homicides last year. This is a 30% decrease since 2018, despite population growth in that time period.

[TempleGuy1000]

Originally Posted by DirectionNorth

Nonsense. Here in Toronto, a city of 2.9 million and one of the most multicultural cities in the world, there were just 70 homicides last year. This is a 30% decrease since 2018, despite population growth in that time period.

I mean, it obviously goes a lot deeper than the few facts I shared. I meant it as in more of a comparison to other US communities and how demographics play a factor. Maybe the multi-cultural wasn't the right word exactly. Canada does have a considerable amount of personal gun ownership, but not as much as the US and certainly not as many illegal guns on the streets. History and culture matter and Canada's immigration and "multi-cultural" melting pot is distinctly different than the United States.

[DirectionNorth]

Originally Posted by TempleGuy1000

I mean, it obviously goes a lot deeper than the few facts I shared. I meant it as in more of a comparison to other US communities and how demographics play a factor. Maybe the multi-cultural wasn't the right word exactly. Canada does have a considerable amount of personal gun ownership, but not as much as the US and certainly not as many illegal guns on the streets. History and culture matter and Canada's immigration and "multi-cultural" melting pot is distinctly different than the United States.

Illegal guns play a part, but cultural factors are more important. Unfortunately, the US has a wild-west culture combined with massive poverty traps and that makes for a toxic combination, minorities or no.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

Murder rates in the US are very much tied to the black community, both as victims and perpetrators.

Templeguy, its absolutely not a surprise to anyone with a brain that less police stops, more criminals being released early and progressive DA policies have exasperated crime issues in our major cities. In general, these policies are based in some weird fantasy land far far away from reality.

[subterranean]

It's generational poverty in American black communities. There, now it's not an elephant.

[TempleGuy1000]

Originally Posted by DirectionNorth

Illegal guns play a part, but cultural factors are more important. Unfortunately, the US has a wild-west culture combined with massive poverty traps and that makes for a toxic combination, minorities or no.

There's a concept that developed in American mythology throughout time called "Rugged Individualism", an entitled sense of "my freedom matters more than the communities need" or "I can ignore the awful realities other people may experience if my freedom and life isn't bothered". IMO, it's poisoned our culture and put us in this anti-intellectual cultural-paralysis where real systematic change is nearly impossible to achieve. There's obviously tons of other factors, but that "wild west" frontier 'spirit' is often the origin.

Originally Posted by LosAngelesSportsFan

In general, these policies are based in some weird fantasy land far far away from reality.

I agree. As a white person, it honestly bothers me that more than double the % of white people have the nerve to say Philly has too many police than people living in neighborhoods far more effected by crime. There are many young white people who have absolutely convinced themselves that anarchy, or whatever it is, is the correct path forward. You could probably write books on where those entitled opinions originate from.


https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/researc...delphians-hard

[Smuttynose1]

Originally Posted by DirectionNorth

Illegal guns play a part, but cultural factors are more important. Unfortunately, the US has a wild-west culture combined with massive poverty traps and that makes for a toxic combination, minorities or no.

In many places, sure, but I'm not sure DC and Philly have a wild-west culture. Clearly, some location-specific factors play a part. Easy access to guns clearly plays a role -- I don't like the lack of sensible gun regulations in the US as much as the next guy, but it's not everything. The reality is the murder rate in places like Boston, NYC, Providence, etc. is much closer to the rate in Toronto than it is to DC or Philly. Perhaps Canada's proximity rubs off on New England/NY.

[edale]

Originally Posted by DirectionNorth

Illegal guns play a part, but cultural factors are more important. Unfortunately, the US has a wild-west culture combined with massive poverty traps and that makes for a toxic combination, minorities or no.

I don't think you really know what you're talking about. Canadians love to paint the US with a broad brush, i.e. statements like "the US has a wild-west culture." As has been said time and time again, the US murder problem is primarily one confined to African American communities, and exacerbated by easy access to guns. It's not linked to the presence of minorities or immigrants generally, but specifically Black Americans- so your comparison to Toronto with large numbers of wealthy Asian immigrants, is really useless. Cities without large Black populations mostly have low homicide rates. That's why cities in the West- the least Black portion of the country- have the lowest homicide rates . It's also why Boston (24% Black) has fewer murders than Philadelphia (42%) or DC (46%).

The US has the nasty legacy of slavery, segregation, and discrimination that has left the Black community more impoverished than other groups. It's also led to high levels of distrust of the justice system and more of a street justice mentality.

[eschaton]

There's a cultural argument related to the U.S.'s homicide rate. To broadly simplify, African slaves acculturated to the southern "culture of honor" - the idea that personal slights needed to be responded to with deadly force. The South was much more into duels and the like than the North was back in the Antebellum era for example, where it was more typical already to go to the town authorities to get things sorted out. For various cultural reasons, the white south slowly gave up the idea of extrajudicial murder (though personal slights are still dealt with more aggressively there than elsewhere), while the black community did not, due to lack of faith in the criminal justice system.

As a result, there is a very, very close relationship between how black an area is and the homicide rate. Generally the blacker a city, the higher the homicide rate, and within a city, the majority (sometimes overwhelming majority) of homicides happen in black neighborhoods/happen to black victims.

As I said upthread, most murder within the black community is fundamentally not "predatory" in nature. It's best understood as "rough justice" - some sort of vigilante vengeance against someone who is seen as having wronged you or one of yours. This can be seen in that not only are most murderers/murder victims in most cities black, they're mostly black teens and men within the ages of 15-32 or so. The more shocking cases of old ladies and babies getting shot certainly do make the evening news, but they are the exceptions, not the general rule. Usually the average murder victim is very similar demographically to the average murderer.

Another aspect of this is what happens to murderers in prison as they get older. Within the prison hierarchy, black prisoners tend to end up at the bottom of the totem pole in many areas, brutalized by white and Latino prison gangs. A much higher proportion of nonblack inmates are, for lack of a better way to put it, fucking psychopaths. Most black prisoners, even convicted murderers, are fundamentally regular people who just were socialized in a peer group where it was considered to be the normal response for a man to shoot someone if they crossed a certain line. When they age out of the young man bravado, they're not really a threat to anyone.

I don't have a good answer to all of this, but I do have an anecdote to show why black people don't trust the police. One of my coworkers had a cousin who was shot and killed years back in South Carolina - her and her three kids. Her cousin's boyfriend (and father to the kids) was the intended target, but he was not home at the time. When he went to the murder scene, the cops ran his info through the database - a standard procedure supposedly in the state. They found he had a standing bench warrant against him for an unrelated (relatively minor) misdemeanor. They arrested him...at his children's murder site. He missed his children's funerals because he couldn't post bail in time. How the hell will a man like that ever trust the criminal justice system again?

[PhillyRising]

Originally Posted by Smuttynose1

In many places, sure, but I'm not sure DC and Philly have a wild-west culture. Clearly, some location-specific factors play a part. Easy access to guns clearly plays a role -- I don't like the lack of sensible gun regulations in the US as much as the next guy, but it's not everything. The reality is the murder rate in places like Boston, NYC, Providence, etc. is much closer to the rate in Toronto than it is to DC or Philly. Perhaps Canada's proximity rubs off on New England/NY.

Guns flow north from Florida.....they tend to land in the cities closer to it than the ones further up 95.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

Los Angeles as of 2/11/23

2023 - 33
2022 - 47
2021 - 55

Down 29.8% from 2022 and 40% from 2023. Overall violent crime down 9.8% and 3.9%.

Great start to the year!