3 ms·

Punishment is much harsher in the US and a lot of mentally ill people don't get treated but go to jail. also in general there is much less support for people at

Punishment is much harsher in the US and a lot of mentally ill people don't get treated but go to jail. also in general there is much less support for people at risk. I assume that people in the US on average aren't worse than people in other countries tries so to me it seems that there is a problem with policies in the US causing higher crime rates.

rayiner 7y ago
> I assume that people in the US on average aren't worse than people in other countries tries so to me it seems that there is a problem with policies in the US causing higher crime rates. Why do you assume that? Murder rates in the US were 10 times higher than in continental Europe even at the beginning of the 20th century, long before support programs existed on either side of the pond. (Indeed, in Europe, all the modern support systems, government welfare, and gun control hasn’t reduced crime—at least homicide rates—at all. Homicide rates in England, France, and Sweden hit modern levels in the 1920s: https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/03/homicide-rates-in-five-western-european-countries-1900-2009-pinker-2011-jpg.jpg https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/03/homicide-rates-in.... Germany and Italy saw major drops in the early 20th century, but I’d probably chalk that up to increased political stability.)
- areyousure 7y ago
  This is not a rebuttal to your graph, whose source ("Better angels.." by Pinker) I know about and understand, but I thought it was useful context for my own understanding: In the same units as that graph, WWII would likely register as over 1000 in Germany (compare with the less than 2 indicated in the graph).
ALittleLight 7y ago
You shouldn't forget about how different races, ethnic groups, and cultures - and how those differences throughout history may affect criminality or poverty. Hispanic and black people are incarcerated at approximately 2 and 6 times the rate of white people respectively[1] in the United States. White Americans are substantially more likely to be incarcerated than Western Europeans, but not as substantially as the non-race differentiated number might suggest. White Americans are incarcerated at a rate similar to Russia. I can't speak to the drug war in Europe, or if it exists, but it is a likely culprit for a large number of American incarcerations. 1.3 million arrests a year are for "possession only"[2] and the number of Americans in prison takes off late 80's early 90's as the drug war is ramping up [3]. My understanding of the American incarceration system, and this is mostly just my synthesized view from reading and thinking about it, I can't easily source this anywhere - is that there was a lot of crime in the late 80's and early 90's, especially in major cities. People realized that basically all violent crime is committed by relatively young men. So - they devised a system where a significant number of problematic young men (1 in 9 men [3]) are locked away for a period of time. 1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_the_United_St... (Under "Ethnicity" heading) 2 - http://www.drugpolicy.org/issues/drug-war-statistics http://www.drugpolicy.org/issues/drug-war-statistics 3 - https://www.sentencingproject.org/criminal-justice-facts/ https://www.sentencingproject.org/criminal-justice-facts/

rayiner 7y ago

> I assume that people in the US on average aren't worse than people in other countries tries so to me it seems that there is a problem with policies in the US causing higher crime rates. Why do you assume that? Murder rates in the US were 10 times higher than in continental Europe even at the beginning of the 20th century, long before support programs existed on either side of the pond. (Indeed, in Europe, all the modern support systems, government welfare, and gun control hasn’t reduced crime—at least homicide rates—at all. Homicide rates in England, France, and Sweden hit modern levels in the 1920s: https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/03/homicide-rates-in-five-western-european-countries-1900-2009-pinker-2011-jpg.jpg https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/03/homicide-rates-in.... Germany and Italy saw major drops in the early 20th century, but I’d probably chalk that up to increased political stability.)

areyousure 7y ago
This is not a rebuttal to your graph, whose source ("Better angels.." by Pinker) I know about and understand, but I thought it was useful context for my own understanding: In the same units as that graph, WWII would likely register as over 1000 in Germany (compare with the less than 2 indicated in the graph).

ALittleLight 7y ago

You shouldn't forget about how different races, ethnic groups, and cultures - and how those differences throughout history may affect criminality or poverty. Hispanic and black people are incarcerated at approximately 2 and 6 times the rate of white people respectively[1] in the United States. White Americans are substantially more likely to be incarcerated than Western Europeans, but not as substantially as the non-race differentiated number might suggest. White Americans are incarcerated at a rate similar to Russia. I can't speak to the drug war in Europe, or if it exists, but it is a likely culprit for a large number of American incarcerations. 1.3 million arrests a year are for "possession only"[2] and the number of Americans in prison takes off late 80's early 90's as the drug war is ramping up [3]. My understanding of the American incarceration system, and this is mostly just my synthesized view from reading and thinking about it, I can't easily source this anywhere - is that there was a lot of crime in the late 80's and early 90's, especially in major cities. People realized that basically all violent crime is committed by relatively young men. So - they devised a system where a significant number of problematic young men (1 in 9 men [3]) are locked away for a period of time. 1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_the_United_St... (Under "Ethnicity" heading) 2 - http://www.drugpolicy.org/issues/drug-war-statistics http://www.drugpolicy.org/issues/drug-war-statistics 3 - https://www.sentencingproject.org/criminal-justice-facts/ https://www.sentencingproject.org/criminal-justice-facts/