You are cherry picking (we all do) and you did not respond to my data concerning the years before, during, and after RG's term in office. You have chosen a few years that work well for you. I could do the same. From 2008 - 2013 unemployment rates in NYC were as "low" as 6.7 percent and as high as 9.9 percent, with three of those years at 8.5 percent or higher. These rates are significantly higher than anything in the previous decade plus or anything in the years since. And yet homicide rates fell from 2008 - 2013. Furthermore, moving to national figures, one might expect, based on your reasoning, that homicide rates. would have reached their high in the 20th century during the years of the great depression. But they didn't. The homicide rates in the "boom years" of the 1950s following WWII were significantly higher than in the 1930s.
I have to run and don't have time now to look at the article you cited from NBER, but I don't have a big problem with it's upshot as you quoted it. From my own reading I would lean toward deterrence as having the greater impact, but I wouldn't bet a lot on it.
I have seen Levitt's work in Freakonomics, but would note that he also gives significant weight to added police and higher incarceration rates. Of course, all the data on abortion only makes sense if one doesn't think of the killing of an unborn child as a homicide in its own right (except in exceptional cases).
Will have to get back to you tomorrow at the earliest about the Brookings study. All the best.
I could be crazy, but it almost seems that each time we increase the "safety net" and "nanny state" and weaken the work/school requirements the worse things get. I'm not a stats person, but has anyone ever written about this beside Thomas Sowell, et al.?
No, I don't think you're crazy. It's just that things like that are very difficult to prove... to the extent that anything can be "proven" in the social sciences. As you can see from what I wrote, it's very difficult to prove that economic well-being, at least as measured by unemployment, is hard to correlate with homicide rates. I think there's a case to be made for what you say. And in Sowell you've found a good place to start! You might want to check out Jason Riley and the late Walter Williams as well. Good luck to you! One counter argument you will have to deal with is why haven't the nanny states in Europe seen rises in crime as well. Of course, those homogenous nations are hard to compare to the much more diverse U.S. I happen to think that diversity is a good thing, but I don't think there is much dispute that it does create problems.
Thanks for the suggestions. I’ll check them out. Am near the end of “Closing of the American Mind “” and he’s discussing the rise of the social sciences vs ‘natural’ which your comment made me think of. More philosophy than I can handle but I’m ploughing thru. I know what you mean by the European nannies, but if you've noticed they are running into problems with the influx of immigrants from the Middle East & Africa who aren't willing to assimilate to an Anglo-Protestant ethic. Yeah, the one that's "systemically racist".
You are doing some heavy reading. You are right that the European nanny states are no Nirvana. it's interesting that we are so often cited as the racist nation among the developed countries, but that's only because the others have so few races, other than the white race, to talk about. You are right that the bigotry of the Europeans is starting to show as immigrants move in. Immigrants assimilate more easily into American than they do into the European countries. And, of course, there's the always present force of anti-Semitism in Europe which dwarfs anything found here. An interesting footnote to the question of racism. We are often told that the fact that blacks are disproportionately incarcerated here is proof of our racist system. But guess where blacks are even more disproportionately incarcerated... Canada. And still more so in the UK and even more so in France. But we don't hear much about it in part because those countries are less apt to air their dirty laundry than is the U.S. and, in part, because blacks make up a much smaller percentage of their populations. So they get much less attention.
Oh... there's so much more I could share, but I will wait to see if you want to continue this thread. If not. I wish you all the best.
I am enjoying this. Do you think what you site is related more to "class" than "race" in Europe? Do you think much of the anti-Semitism is more related to the large number of Muslims coming in or the lingering fundamentalist Protestantism? We have the original sin of slavery, war & Jim Crow while Europe ended slavery by legislation in individual countries. I sometimes wonder if it was a "United States of Europe" would it have been different. Also there were so few black & brown citizens at the time. The Imperialism of Europe was just beginning, so emigration within the empires was minimal. Seems like Brexit is similar to "secession". I value opinions and other points of view. Wish others would join in.
I am enjoying it also. I wouldn't say class so much as race and ethnicity (assuming one thinks of Jews as an ethnic group). You make a good point about the relationship between anti-Semitism and the arrival of large number of Muslims into Europe. I'm sure the Muslims drive up the anti-Semitism, but it would be present even if there were no Muslims in Europe. That would be because of the religious heritage you speak of. But I would say "Christianity" rather than "fundamental Protestantism," because the roots of anti-Semitism in Europe go back to near the origins of Christianity, long before the Protestant Reformation. But even if you take Christianity away, I think there would still be some anti-Semitism in Europe. Less, but some. And that, I think, is because Jews tend to be very successful wherever they have been (and people always hate those who are successful) and because they tend to stick to themselves. There is nothing wrong with the latter, but, sadly, it does bother some.
I said I had some other stuff to share. I did some research on people moving about OECD countries. What I found surprised me greatly. From Pew Research I found the number of Americans living abroad in developed countries and the number coming here from those same countries (simply Google “Origins and Destinations of the World’s Migrants” to see the raw data for yourself). I then took into account each country’s population. The picture is quite remarkable. I should emphasize that I am only talking about people who were born in one country and moved to another (what are often called ex-pats).
Moving up the scale we find that Australians have been ten times more likely to move here than we have been to move there, Japanese have been sixteen times more likely, the Germans and French both eighteen times, the Spanish and the British both nineteen times, Canadians twenty-five times, Italians thirty-five times, the Swiss forty times, the Dutch fifty-eight times, Israelis sixty-four times, Turks seventy-five times, Swedes eighty-three times, Norwegians ninety-five times, South Koreans one hundred four times, New Zealanders one hundred five times, Belgians and Singaporeans one hundred sixteen times, Finns one hundred twenty times, Danes one hundred seventy-three times, Austrians one hundred ninety times, Greeks two hundred twenty-eight times, the Irish three hundred twenty-four times, Czechs three hundred sixty-six times, and Portuguese six hundred twenty-six times more likely to move here than we have been to move there.
The above leaves only the developed countries of Cyprus, Estonia, Iceland, Luxembourg, and Slovenia unaccounted for. I was not able to get precise enough numbers from those five countries to do the same kind of calculation I did for the others, but
the estimates I did get (from the same site), make it clear that the movement in these five remaining countries follows the trend of all those above. Sorry to be so long-winded :), but rather than just cherry-pick a few countries, I figured I would give you all of them.
You are cherry picking (we all do) and you did not respond to my data concerning the years before, during, and after RG's term in office. You have chosen a few years that work well for you. I could do the same. From 2008 - 2013 unemployment rates in NYC were as "low" as 6.7 percent and as high as 9.9 percent, with three of those years at 8.5 percent or higher. These rates are significantly higher than anything in the previous decade plus or anything in the years since. And yet homicide rates fell from 2008 - 2013. Furthermore, moving to national figures, one might expect, based on your reasoning, that homicide rates. would have reached their high in the 20th century during the years of the great depression. But they didn't. The homicide rates in the "boom years" of the 1950s following WWII were significantly higher than in the 1930s.
I have to run and don't have time now to look at the article you cited from NBER, but I don't have a big problem with it's upshot as you quoted it. From my own reading I would lean toward deterrence as having the greater impact, but I wouldn't bet a lot on it.
I have seen Levitt's work in Freakonomics, but would note that he also gives significant weight to added police and higher incarceration rates. Of course, all the data on abortion only makes sense if one doesn't think of the killing of an unborn child as a homicide in its own right (except in exceptional cases).
Will have to get back to you tomorrow at the earliest about the Brookings study. All the best.
I could be crazy, but it almost seems that each time we increase the "safety net" and "nanny state" and weaken the work/school requirements the worse things get. I'm not a stats person, but has anyone ever written about this beside Thomas Sowell, et al.?
No, I don't think you're crazy. It's just that things like that are very difficult to prove... to the extent that anything can be "proven" in the social sciences. As you can see from what I wrote, it's very difficult to prove that economic well-being, at least as measured by unemployment, is hard to correlate with homicide rates. I think there's a case to be made for what you say. And in Sowell you've found a good place to start! You might want to check out Jason Riley and the late Walter Williams as well. Good luck to you! One counter argument you will have to deal with is why haven't the nanny states in Europe seen rises in crime as well. Of course, those homogenous nations are hard to compare to the much more diverse U.S. I happen to think that diversity is a good thing, but I don't think there is much dispute that it does create problems.
Thanks for the suggestions. I’ll check them out. Am near the end of “Closing of the American Mind “” and he’s discussing the rise of the social sciences vs ‘natural’ which your comment made me think of. More philosophy than I can handle but I’m ploughing thru. I know what you mean by the European nannies, but if you've noticed they are running into problems with the influx of immigrants from the Middle East & Africa who aren't willing to assimilate to an Anglo-Protestant ethic. Yeah, the one that's "systemically racist".
You are doing some heavy reading. You are right that the European nanny states are no Nirvana. it's interesting that we are so often cited as the racist nation among the developed countries, but that's only because the others have so few races, other than the white race, to talk about. You are right that the bigotry of the Europeans is starting to show as immigrants move in. Immigrants assimilate more easily into American than they do into the European countries. And, of course, there's the always present force of anti-Semitism in Europe which dwarfs anything found here. An interesting footnote to the question of racism. We are often told that the fact that blacks are disproportionately incarcerated here is proof of our racist system. But guess where blacks are even more disproportionately incarcerated... Canada. And still more so in the UK and even more so in France. But we don't hear much about it in part because those countries are less apt to air their dirty laundry than is the U.S. and, in part, because blacks make up a much smaller percentage of their populations. So they get much less attention.
Oh... there's so much more I could share, but I will wait to see if you want to continue this thread. If not. I wish you all the best.
I am enjoying this. Do you think what you site is related more to "class" than "race" in Europe? Do you think much of the anti-Semitism is more related to the large number of Muslims coming in or the lingering fundamentalist Protestantism? We have the original sin of slavery, war & Jim Crow while Europe ended slavery by legislation in individual countries. I sometimes wonder if it was a "United States of Europe" would it have been different. Also there were so few black & brown citizens at the time. The Imperialism of Europe was just beginning, so emigration within the empires was minimal. Seems like Brexit is similar to "secession". I value opinions and other points of view. Wish others would join in.
I am enjoying it also. I wouldn't say class so much as race and ethnicity (assuming one thinks of Jews as an ethnic group). You make a good point about the relationship between anti-Semitism and the arrival of large number of Muslims into Europe. I'm sure the Muslims drive up the anti-Semitism, but it would be present even if there were no Muslims in Europe. That would be because of the religious heritage you speak of. But I would say "Christianity" rather than "fundamental Protestantism," because the roots of anti-Semitism in Europe go back to near the origins of Christianity, long before the Protestant Reformation. But even if you take Christianity away, I think there would still be some anti-Semitism in Europe. Less, but some. And that, I think, is because Jews tend to be very successful wherever they have been (and people always hate those who are successful) and because they tend to stick to themselves. There is nothing wrong with the latter, but, sadly, it does bother some.
I said I had some other stuff to share. I did some research on people moving about OECD countries. What I found surprised me greatly. From Pew Research I found the number of Americans living abroad in developed countries and the number coming here from those same countries (simply Google “Origins and Destinations of the World’s Migrants” to see the raw data for yourself). I then took into account each country’s population. The picture is quite remarkable. I should emphasize that I am only talking about people who were born in one country and moved to another (what are often called ex-pats).
Moving up the scale we find that Australians have been ten times more likely to move here than we have been to move there, Japanese have been sixteen times more likely, the Germans and French both eighteen times, the Spanish and the British both nineteen times, Canadians twenty-five times, Italians thirty-five times, the Swiss forty times, the Dutch fifty-eight times, Israelis sixty-four times, Turks seventy-five times, Swedes eighty-three times, Norwegians ninety-five times, South Koreans one hundred four times, New Zealanders one hundred five times, Belgians and Singaporeans one hundred sixteen times, Finns one hundred twenty times, Danes one hundred seventy-three times, Austrians one hundred ninety times, Greeks two hundred twenty-eight times, the Irish three hundred twenty-four times, Czechs three hundred sixty-six times, and Portuguese six hundred twenty-six times more likely to move here than we have been to move there.
The above leaves only the developed countries of Cyprus, Estonia, Iceland, Luxembourg, and Slovenia unaccounted for. I was not able to get precise enough numbers from those five countries to do the same kind of calculation I did for the others, but
the estimates I did get (from the same site), make it clear that the movement in these five remaining countries follows the trend of all those above. Sorry to be so long-winded :), but rather than just cherry-pick a few countries, I figured I would give you all of them.
Now you can get back to Harold Bloom. :)