How much do you know about US homicide rates? - economystified

[economystified]

See full post at: http://economystified.blogspot.com/2014/04/us-homicide-rates.html

The FBI releases an annual data set showing some broad, but comprehensive crime stats called the Uniform Crime Report (UCR).  The UCR complies records of all known crimes committed in any US city with a population over 10,000 in a year.

I downloaded the most recent complete UCR the other day, and started playing with the data.  Frequently, I was found myself surprised by what I was seeing.  Quite a few cities I think of as "dangerous" actually had lower crime rates than I anticipated, and vice versa.

I can't tell you where, exactly, I got the idea that NYC was an unsafe place, for example.  But it turns out, the Big Apple has some of the lowest crime rates in the nation.  The completely incorrect idea had gotten into my head somehow, and I never even thought to question it.

We often don't think about our own intuition or assumptions, or wonder how they develop, do we?  We just kinda feel like we know what we know - its not until we take the exam that we realize there are gaps in our understanding.

But data gives us the objective information needed to keep those prejudices in check.

SO - of the US's 72 cities with populations 250k or greater, here are the ones you were least likely to be killed in, in 2012.  Do any of these surprise you?

Continue reading at: http://economystified.blogspot.com/2014/04/us-homicide-rates.html