What is the report from the UK?

pdg

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Since it is not comparing apples to apples and, as you said, is very raw data, I think the per capita comparison has very little substance to it and is an easy way to skew the data to fit one side of an argument. You know, the media's SOP. It is a gross number that has to be used in comparison but is very misleading if it is the only data used.

The raw data and the per 'x' number are two different things really.

Comparing the raw numbers is like comparing apples to elephants - entirely useless.

Comparing with per capita is the closest we can get to apples Vs apples - it's like braeburn Vs granny smith - still not ideal but the best we have.

I tried to support the immigrant numbers you listed and while I found the same numbers I also found much wider numbers so I do not know what is accurate. I know nothing about immigration in your neck of the woods so I do not know if it is a problem for you society/cultural wise or

The numbers for immigration are always wildly disparate...

It's very rarely published as to what basis is used - is it immigrants this year, does it include illegal traffic, does it include those with a visa (valid, misused or expired), does it include those that have been nationalised, first generation, second/third, those that arrive as infants?

Due to the fact that every single 'study' provides a different figure the only real (fairly quick) way to drag out a comparison is to Google "US population immigrant percentage" and the same for UK - and take the first result.

With some digging I could very likely find data to support any number between 0.00001% and 99.9999% for either location.

Some sources say it's a massive problem here, some say it's not an issue worth worrying over - and all sides have a political agenda behind them so I literally cannot draw any definite conclusion I trust myself, let alone expect others to trust.

Illegal aliens are a big problem here and contribute heavily in regards to major crimes.

I obviously can't speak to your location but here (bearing in mind my above comment) I can't say that's really the case.

Illegals are instrumental (by coercion or choice) in major crimes like drug trafficking and human trafficking, prostitution, etc. and all manor of less major crimes - but it's a small percentage of the total illegals involved (most are simply trying to get by and hide) and very rarely in charge.

We have far larger problems with people who are here perfectly legally to be honest (and that's a comparative larger, not a countrywide issue affecting everyone directly).
 

pdg

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In general, crime rates (the per-whatever rate, not just the count) goes up as population density increases. So larger cities (overall, not an absolute) tend to have higher rates than smaller cities and rural areas. Of course, other factors confound the heck out of that (economics being perhaps the biggest).

That's a real yes, no, maybe, sometimes comment ;)

It'd take more time than I'm prepared to invest, but a quick ponder over the numbers suggests it's pretty comparable living out in the sticks as it is in a major city - if...

Almost all of the figures are by year, which skews analysis.

In smaller places stuff might not happen for a few years, but when it does happen the smaller base means the percentage is way higher, that year.

Over 5, 10 years (etc.) a lot of the numbers even out quite well.

There are always exceptions and anomalies of course, and I still prefer being out of town..
 

Gerry Seymour

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That's a real yes, no, maybe, sometimes comment ;)

It'd take more time than I'm prepared to invest, but a quick ponder over the numbers suggests it's pretty comparable living out in the sticks as it is in a major city - if...

Almost all of the figures are by year, which skews analysis.

In smaller places stuff might not happen for a few years, but when it does happen the smaller base means the percentage is way higher, that year.

Over 5, 10 years (etc.) a lot of the numbers even out quite well.

There are always exceptions and anomalies of course, and I still prefer being out of town..
Here's a quick PDF that shows how much variation there can be: https://ovc.ncjrs.gov/ncvrw2016/content/section-6/PDF/2016NCVRW_6_UrbanRural-508.pdf. You'll see the urban/suburban areas consistently have higher rates, and rural areas consistently have the lowest rates. Given that this is averaged over the entire country, it's unlikely a spike in any given rural area will correct the difference (since it's likely some of the areas were in a spike during the year used).

There's a strong suggestion that the lower incidence of interaction in rural areas (translation: spending less time around people) is a major factor. If you don't see people as often, you're less likely to punch one of them. :D
 

pdg

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Here's a quick PDF that shows how much variation there can be: https://ovc.ncjrs.gov/ncvrw2016/content/section-6/PDF/2016NCVRW_6_UrbanRural-508.pdf. You'll see the urban/suburban areas consistently have higher rates, and rural areas consistently have the lowest rates. Given that this is averaged over the entire country, it's unlikely a spike in any given rural area will correct the difference (since it's likely some of the areas were in a spike during the year used).

I'll be honest, I was expecting more variation, and for it to be more consistent.

The biggest swing appears to be roughly 1:1.5 - which can more than account for the spikes in rural areas being out of whack or discounted.

I was half expecting a variance by a factor of 5 or 10 when I opened it...

I'm discounting the rows for larceny and property/vehicle crime - because that will likely include stuff like petty shoplifting, boundary disputes and unroadworthy vehicles - which I deem to not be relevant in a discussion about safety of a location. And if I did include all of those, it looks like suburban is worse than urban anyway, which doesn't really track with population density being a deciding factor.

There's a strong suggestion that the lower incidence of interaction in rural areas (translation: spending less time around people) is a major factor. If you don't see people as often, you're less likely to punch one of them. :D

Now that I can get behind :hilarious:
 

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Rape, overall, is not so much a "stranger danger" problem, so weapons probably don't change the incidence much.
you can say much the same for murder, I work it out a good few years ago that you were significant more at risk of a violent end ( or just violent assault) by someone you are close to, either emotional or geographical like neighbours), so the most dangerous place to be was or around your own home or in the company of friends and family
 
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Gerry Seymour

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I'll be honest, I was expecting more variation, and for it to be more consistent.

The biggest swing appears to be roughly 1:1.5 - which can more than account for the spikes in rural areas being out of whack or discounted.

I was half expecting a variance by a factor of 5 or 10 when I opened it...

I'm discounting the rows for larceny and property/vehicle crime - because that will likely include stuff like petty shoplifting, boundary disputes and unroadworthy vehicles - which I deem to not be relevant in a discussion about safety of a location. And if I did include all of those, it looks like suburban is worse than urban anyway, which doesn't really track with population density being a deciding factor.



Now that I can get behind :hilarious:
Yeah, there's a lot of research looking into why that happens so much in suburban areas. It seems to still be an effect of the urban areas, as smaller towns (similar population density to suburbs, but no real urban areas around) don't seem to see the same effect. It's more a contrast of urban-influenced areas (including suburbs), so the population density in the urban-suburban complex is apparently what matters.

I'm curious if the effect is the same in European areas. I didn't readily find similar statistics, but that might be Google figuring out I'm in the US, and we don't really know other countries exist. :p
 

pdg

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I'm curious if the effect is the same in European areas. I didn't readily find similar statistics, but that might be Google figuring out I'm in the US, and we don't really know other countries exist. :p

For the figures I'm getting I'm using google.com to find the US numbers and google.co.uk for the UK ones...

Yes, the order of results are different.
 

pdg

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So, a bit more pondering with numbers...

The comparison of London and NYC has been drawn, following the headline news of London having a higher murder rate than NY for the first time.

Not a bad comparison given the population figures are very very close (just over 8.5m each).

There are still a few things to consider with this though.

The headline was based on figures for the first two months of 2018. Just two months.

Over the year of 2018, there were 135 unlawful killings in London.

NYC - 289.

Slightly less favourable - but to be noted is that not all that many years ago NYC was recording over 2,000 murders per year and London was hovering about 200.

Both have improved, but NYC easily wins the prize for most improved student.
 

pdg

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Aaaaand another one - don't worry, nearly done for a bit ;)

This about using the "X per 100,000 of population" thing.

From raw data, for 2017 (latest comparison year I found easily) shows unlawful killings in the country of:

US - 17,284

UK - 709

Does that mean you're 25 times more likely to be killed if you live in the US? No. That's silly.

So take it down to per 100,000. That's meaning to randomly select 100,000 residents from the entire country and say that from those, this is how many will be murdered.

US - 5.3

UK - 1.3

So 4 times more likely, not great, but way better than 25...
 

pdg

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I found something else too - I don't care if it's accurate or relevant...

Drug use in the UK is apparently much higher than in the US - with opiates for example the per capita figure is double.

That explains it, most of us are too stoned to bother with crime ;)
 

Gerry Seymour

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I found something else too - I don't care if it's accurate or relevant...

Drug use in the UK is apparently much higher than in the US - with opiates for example the per capita figure is double.

That explains it, most of us are too stoned to bother with crime ;)
Or just unable to actually manage to look threatening.
 

pdg

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Or just unable to actually manage to look threatening.

Not threatening?

How very dare you!

Here's our average "I'm going to beat you up" face:

Bertie-Wooster-tatler-14mar17-rex_b.jpg


"Not threatening" indeed, the very idea!
 

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In general, most illegal immigrants (regardless of country) are too busy trying to avoid notice to get wrapped up in violent crime.

Agreed, but, there is another factor that probably contributes to the reported crime rate for illegal immigrants being so much lower than the crime rate for citizens.

Like you mentioned with rape, a lot of violent crime in general is committed by people who know each other and are demographically similar. So there's a strong chance that for illegal immigrants who do commit violent crimes, their victim is likely to also be an illegal immigrant, and may also be trying to avoid notice and be too afraid to go to the police.
 

Monkey Turned Wolf

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In reply to 1 - how else should you look at it?

Yes, there are more people in the US, but looking "per 100,000" (or maybe "per capita") is the only valid comparison.

Let's say a town of 100,000 has 1 crime - you can scale that to say a town of 1,000,000 can reasonably be expected to have 10. If the bigger town has 5, you can conclude that it's half as violent (or twice as safe) as the small town - or in another way that each individual is half as likely to be the victim of said crime.

If we were to just use raw numbers though (100k town 1 crime, 1m town 10 crimes) then the bigger town looks 10 times more violent.
I'm not interested in getting involved in this discussion at all, but want to point out that some of your logic here isn't good science. If a town of any number has 1 crime...that is too small a number to scale to any other town. Let's say that one year that town has 1 crime, and you scale it so the 1mil town needs 10, like you said. That part makes sense. Now next year, there are 4 crimes in the town. Objectively, 4 is not that much higher than 1, and 3 more crimes could easily happen from year to year, but now the 1mil town is allowed 40 crimes, rather than 10, to be considered as safe as the other town. Next year, there is no crime, that 1mil is not allowed anything despite having ten times the population. Finally, a serial arsonist comes to town, and commits 25 arsons over the course of a year. Now that bigger town is allowed 250 crimes in the comparison, versus the 10 from 4 years before. That's the issue that comes when you try to scale-there is a lot more variability with smaller numbers.
 

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I'm not interested in getting involved in this discussion at all, but want to point out that some of your logic here isn't good science. If a town of any number has 1 crime...that is too small a number to scale to any other town. Let's say that one year that town has 1 crime, and you scale it so the 1mil town needs 10, like you said. That part makes sense. Now next year, there are 4 crimes in the town. Objectively, 4 is not that much higher than 1, and 3 more crimes could easily happen from year to year, but now the 1mil town is allowed 40 crimes, rather than 10, to be considered as safe as the other town. Next year, there is no crime, that 1mil is not allowed anything despite having ten times the population. Finally, a serial arsonist comes to town, and commits 25 arsons over the course of a year. Now that bigger town is allowed 250 crimes in the comparison, versus the 10 from 4 years before. That's the issue that comes when you try to scale-there is a lot more variability with smaller numbers.

I read that four times. The last three very slowly. It's not that I disagree because I have no idea what is being discussed. I am so very confused.
 

Monkey Turned Wolf

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I read that four times. The last three very slowly. It's not that I disagree because I have no idea what is being discussed. I am so very confused.
This might turn into a bit of a math problem, but hopefully it helps.

So basically, imagine two towns, X and Y. Town X has 100,000 people, and Town Y has 1,000,000.

You are trying to compare the two towns to see which one is more crime-ridden, and your way of doing it is comparing crimes per 100,000 people. Town Y is hoping to be considered "safer" than town X. The issue is, there is not a whole lot of crimes per 100,000 people.

So you map it out over 4 years.

In the first year, Town X only has 1 crime. This means, to be considered as safe or safer, Town Y can have up to 10 crimes.
In the second year, Town X only has 4 crime. This means, to be considered as safe or safer, Town Y can have up to 40 crimes.
In the third year, Town X happens to not have any crimes committed. As a result, Town Y can't have a single crime committed to be on the same level of "safeness" as Town X, despite have 900,000 more people.
In the fourth year, there's one particular person in Town X who commits a lot of crimes, say 25. Now, despite not being able to have a single crime committed last year, the amount they are allowed is 250 crimes.

The variation from 0 to 5, with an outlier of 25, is a lot smaller than the variation of 0 to 40, with an outlier of 250.
Basically, I'm trying to say that when the numbers being compared for a ratio are high enough, the amount of variance allowed by each ends up being unfair, as a marginal/insignificant change (1 crime to 4 crimes) in the smaller scale becomes equivalent to a more significant change (10 crimes to 40 crimes) in a larger scale. In part because the larger scale has to average out multiple versions of the smaller scale.

This wouldn't be an issue as much with higher numbers, however when you are looking at 1 per 100,000 to 5 per 100,000, it could potentially be a problem.

I am sure this made as little sense to most people as my other post, but hopefully it helped.
 

Buka

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This might turn into a bit of a math problem, but hopefully it helps.

So basically, imagine two towns, X and Y. Town X has 100,000 people, and Town Y has 1,000,000.

You are trying to compare the two towns to see which one is more crime-ridden, and your way of doing it is comparing crimes per 100,000 people. Town Y is hoping to be considered "safer" than town X. The issue is, there is not a whole lot of crimes per 100,000 people.

So you map it out over 4 years.

In the first year, Town X only has 1 crime. This means, to be considered as safe or safer, Town Y can have up to 10 crimes.
In the second year, Town X only has 4 crime. This means, to be considered as safe or safer, Town Y can have up to 40 crimes.
In the third year, Town X happens to not have any crimes committed. As a result, Town Y can't have a single crime committed to be on the same level of "safeness" as Town X, despite have 900,000 more people.
In the fourth year, there's one particular person in Town X who commits a lot of crimes, say 25. Now, despite not being able to have a single crime committed last year, the amount they are allowed is 250 crimes.

The variation from 0 to 5, with an outlier of 25, is a lot smaller than the variation of 0 to 40, with an outlier of 250.
Basically, I'm trying to say that when the numbers being compared for a ratio are high enough, the amount of variance allowed by each ends up being unfair, as a marginal/insignificant change (1 crime to 4 crimes) in the smaller scale becomes equivalent to a more significant change (10 crimes to 40 crimes) in a larger scale. In part because the larger scale has to average out multiple versions of the smaller scale.

This wouldn't be an issue as much with higher numbers, however when you are looking at 1 per 100,000 to 5 per 100,000, it could potentially be a problem.

I am sure this made as little sense to most people as my other post, but hopefully it helped.

I think you forgot the enoch.

 

Gerry Seymour

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This might turn into a bit of a math problem, but hopefully it helps.

So basically, imagine two towns, X and Y. Town X has 100,000 people, and Town Y has 1,000,000.

You are trying to compare the two towns to see which one is more crime-ridden, and your way of doing it is comparing crimes per 100,000 people. Town Y is hoping to be considered "safer" than town X. The issue is, there is not a whole lot of crimes per 100,000 people.

So you map it out over 4 years.

In the first year, Town X only has 1 crime. This means, to be considered as safe or safer, Town Y can have up to 10 crimes.
In the second year, Town X only has 4 crime. This means, to be considered as safe or safer, Town Y can have up to 40 crimes.
In the third year, Town X happens to not have any crimes committed. As a result, Town Y can't have a single crime committed to be on the same level of "safeness" as Town X, despite have 900,000 more people.
In the fourth year, there's one particular person in Town X who commits a lot of crimes, say 25. Now, despite not being able to have a single crime committed last year, the amount they are allowed is 250 crimes.

The variation from 0 to 5, with an outlier of 25, is a lot smaller than the variation of 0 to 40, with an outlier of 250.
Basically, I'm trying to say that when the numbers being compared for a ratio are high enough, the amount of variance allowed by each ends up being unfair, as a marginal/insignificant change (1 crime to 4 crimes) in the smaller scale becomes equivalent to a more significant change (10 crimes to 40 crimes) in a larger scale. In part because the larger scale has to average out multiple versions of the smaller scale.

This wouldn't be an issue as much with higher numbers, however when you are looking at 1 per 100,000 to 5 per 100,000, it could potentially be a problem.

I am sure this made as little sense to most people as my other post, but hopefully it helped.
This is why comparisons of high-density to low-density areas have to use either multi-year stats (as PDG suggested) or stats across all similar areas (as was used in the PDF I linked to). This virtually eliminates these erratic effects on small numbers.
 

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