Is violent crime in the United States?

The astonishing decline in violent crime, which began in the nineties and extended until the mid-2010s, is one of the most important and most underestimated messages about the latest memory. This made his reversal so worrying during pandemic.

In the first full year of pandemic, the FBI achieved 22,134 murders across the country, compared to 16,669 in 2019 and an increase of around 34 percent, the sharpest one-year increase in the record resolution of modern crime. In 2021, Philadelphia alone recorded a record of 562 murders, while Baltimore had 337 murders in Nahberkord. Between 2019 and 2020, the average number of weekly emergency rooms for shots rose by 37 percent and remained largely high the following year.

In the 2024 elections, violent crimes in the USA was a major political problem for the first time in some time. A PEW survey this year showed that 58 percent of the Americans believed that the crime for the president and the congress should be a top priority, compared to 47 percent in 2021.

And yet, when the presidential campaign developed, the violent crime of pandemic had already subsided – and the crime rates have repeatedly decreased. The crime report of FBI 2023 showed that the murder decreased by almost 12 percent compared to the previous year, and in 2024 it fell to around 16,700 murders, which corresponds to the pre -pandemic level. The early figures for 2025 are so promising that Jeff Asher, one of the best independent analysts for crime, recently asked in one piece whether this year could have the lowest murder rate in the history of US history.

Everything that raises two questions: What leads to a reduction in crime such as the increasing pandemic era? And why is it so many of us to believe?

We should not jump to this year's crime rates based on the early data, especially since we are starting summer when violent crime almost always increases. Crime data in the United States are also stained and slow – I can tell you how many soybeans the United States raised in March, but I cannot tell you how many people in the United States have been murdered this year.

But what we can see looks very good. The real-time criminal index, an academic project that collects crime data from more than 380 police authorities for almost 100 million people, estimates in the United States in the USA until March compared to the estimated 1,899 in the same months in the same months last year. This is a decline of almost 22 percent. Overall, violent crime has decreased by around 11 percent. Motor vehicle theft, which became an epidemic during pandemic, has dropped by over 26 percent.

Go to the local level and the picture is getting better. In Baltimore, which The wire Music synonym for violent, drug -related crime and fell to 199 last year, with the best performance in over a decade. At the beginning of May, the city had 45 murders, another third compared to the same period of last year. The urban emergency rooms that were once full of gunfire have become quiet.

How much lower could it go nationally? The record -low murder rate, at least since national records in 1960, is 4.45 per 100,000 in 2014. According to Asher, the murder has decreased in 25 of the 30 cities in which most murders were reported in 2023.

What is behind the drop?

In short: the pandemic led to an enormous increase in violent crimes, and how pandemic decreased, also the wave.

The closure of the schools during pandemic, especially in higher criminal cities in the northeast, meant far more young male-that-of-the-art perpetrators of violent crimes or victims. The closure of the social services left fewer resources for them; And the sheer stress of a unique health disaster set off everyone. The murder of George Floyd in spring 2020 led to a collapse of the community confidence in police work, which in turn seemed to lead to less aggressive police work. However, when pandemic decreased, these buffers came back and provided a natural brake for violent crimes.

However, the government from national level to cities also took direct measures to meet the flood of violence. The White House under President Joe Biden inserted hundreds of millions of dollars into the interruption programs for violence in the community, which aim to break the cycle of retaliation that can lead to murder. The strategy for the reduction in violence of Baltimore has brought together community groups and law enforcement authorities to prevent people who are most likely to be committed to gun violence. And the erosion of police forces occurred nationwide during the pandemic has largely stopped.

The situation is anything but perfect. Although Floyd's murder triggered a nationwide settlement with police violence, recent data showed that the murders of the police increased again and again, partly because fear of crime often ended the dynamics of reforms. Here in New York the crimes rose on the trains, even if the overall crime in the U -Bahnen has fallen on historical lows, and have increased fears of lawlessness.

Why can't we believe it?

Since the weekend at the Memorial Day is marked at the beginning of summer, the next few months will determine whether the pandemic was really only a slip in the long -term reduction in violent crimes. However, what we can say is that most people do not notice the positive trends. A Gallup survey in October 2024 showed that 64 percent of the Americans believed that there was more crime nationwide than in the previous year, although the post -pandemic crime drop was good in 2024.

But such results are not surprising. One of the most reliable results in surveys is that you say yes when you ask the Americans whether the crime is increasing. Surprisingly, the Americans reported in 23 out of 27 national surveys that Gallup have carried out since 1993 that it rose nationwide, although most of these surveys were carried out during the long decline in crime.

Crime is one of the best examples that we have biased with bad news. By definition, a murder is an outlier event that attracts our attention and inevitably leads the nightly local news. Sometimes, as during pandemic, this tendency can match reality. But if we don't adapt to what actually happens around us – not just what we do think Completes – it will not only make us believe that our cities are more dangerous than they really are. Energy will juice energy that can really make a difference.

A version of this story originally appeared in the Good Newsletter. Register here!