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posted by martyb on Saturday August 08 2020, @11:27AM   Printer-friendly
from the is-crime-data-report-trustworthy? dept.

I imagine most people here already know the stats, it's nothing new, but I found it interesting to review.

Many Americans Are Convinced Crime Is Rising In The U.S. They're Wrong:

"People estimated their risks for a whole host of bad-news life events — robbery, burglary, job loss and losing their health insurance. But the survey didn't just ask respondents to rate their chances: It also asked whether those things had actually happened to them in the last year.

And that combination of questions revealed something important about American fear: We are terrible at estimating our risk of crime — much worse than we are at guessing the danger of other bad things. Across that decade, respondents put their chance of being robbed in the coming year at about 15 percent. Looking back, the actual rate of robbery was 1.2 percent. In contrast, when asked to rate their risk of upcoming job loss, people guessed it was about 14.5 percent — much closer to the actual job loss rate of 12.9 percent."

[...] "In 2019, according to a survey conducted by Gallup, about 64 percent of Americans believed that there was more crime in the U.S. than there was a year ago. It's a belief we've consistently held for decades now, but as you can see in the chart below, we've been, just as consistently, very wrong."

Like I said, more of the same, but might be worth a discussion.


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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Saturday August 08 2020, @03:12PM (7 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Saturday August 08 2020, @03:12PM (#1033464)

    throwing several hundred millions of people who just climbed out of poverty back into want

    All comrades are equal, but some are more equal than others.

    Hundreds of millions of people live in poverty today, as they did yesterday, years and centuries ago, and in the opinion of those not in poverty this situation is inevitable and will continue for years and centuries into the future. A few more or less is just irrelevant, if you're not the one trying to sleep in a home infested with pests and disease, going to great lengths for water to drink for the day, etc. Clue: the people who make the decisions aren't the ones that brush away insects from their faces at night and spend hours just attending to basic necessities of life every day.

    The people who make the decisions see chaos (like the COVID response) as opportunity, not to eradicate poverty, but to become richer and more powerful. If a few hundred million people slip deeper into poverty, that boosts the relative power of those who are not in poverty - it's a net win, for the decision makers.

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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Saturday August 08 2020, @06:06PM (6 children)

    by Phoenix666 (552) on Saturday August 08 2020, @06:06PM (#1033529) Journal

    I agree with everything you wrote.

    The rest of us who are not decision makers really must stop taking our cues from them, exactly because they are manipulating public opinion for their own benefit. It does not serve any of us to submit to their selective outrage porn, which pits us against each other. Rather, we ought to be phlegmatic in general. If we can stop savaging each other like good little puppets on strings we can progress; if not, we'll wind up coming to blows whether we want to or not, because the larger currents of social unrest will sweep us all away.

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    Washington DC delenda est.
    • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 08 2020, @06:22PM (4 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 08 2020, @06:22PM (#1033540)

      You'rea moron promoting death by touting the rebellious ideology of the US over proper medical advice.
      Go fuck yourself shill and/or traitor.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 08 2020, @06:40PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 08 2020, @06:40PM (#1033546)

        Hey! You can't talk to Phoenix666 like that! Even if it is true!

        • (Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Sunday August 09 2020, @01:01PM

          by Phoenix666 (552) on Sunday August 09 2020, @01:01PM (#1033774) Journal

          You both walked right into my trap and proved me right. Cheers.

          --
          Washington DC delenda est.
      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Sunday August 09 2020, @01:00PM (1 child)

        by Phoenix666 (552) on Sunday August 09 2020, @01:00PM (#1033773) Journal

        Thank you for helping me make my case.

        --
        Washington DC delenda est.
        • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 09 2020, @08:06PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 09 2020, @08:06PM (#1033984)

          (He thinks he's winning! Isn't that cute!)

          In the Words of Gordon Lightfoot (he's Canadian, you know):
          ♫Sometimes, I think it's a shame, that I get feeling better when I'm feeling no pain.♫
          And
          ♫Sometimes, I think it's a sin, when I feel like I'm winning but I'm losing again.♫

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 08 2020, @07:42PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 08 2020, @07:42PM (#1033599)

      Words of wisdom from one of the puppets.