What are the real factors impacting crime?

The Birdman corresponds with Yale professor John Lott

 

 

In a message dated 6/20/01 1:40:29 AM, jbryant9@tampabay.rr.com writes:

From: John Bryant (www.thebirdman.org)

To: John Lott

Re: Multifactorial impact on crime

Dear Prof Lott:

While you are rightly famous for noting that 'more guns, less crime', it

struck me that the impact of guns which was quoted in one of your papers

seemed rather small, viz 1% (sorry, the reference escapes me). More to the

point, however, is that thee are other important factors which would

intuitively seem to have an important impact on crime, and which cannot be

ignored without introducing a veritable Black Hole into the picture of what

really affects crime. These factors are:

* Race (blacks are incarcerated at 9 times the rate of whites, Hispanics

about 3 times)

* Racial homogeniety (according to Dr Thomas Sowell, there are no

multicultural societies without significant racial conflict except those in

which one race is dominant, and conflict may correlate with crime)

* Age (Younger populations commit more crimes)

* Intelligence (low IQ prevents people from seeing the connection between

misbehavior and punishment)

Other possible factors include income level (do the poor commit more

crimes?), drug use (are the spaced-out more prone to crime?)

My point is that studies which do not include factors such as the starred

ones may be significantly deficient, tho this is not intended to deny the

importance of your pioneering work.

Therefore, your reactions would be appreciated.

 

From: <JohnRLott@aol.com> To: <john@thebirdman.org> Subject: Re: Important question Date: Wednesday, June 20, 2001 1:54 PM

Dear John:

Thanks very much for your note. My book examines hundreds of factors that impact crime rates. Demographics do indeed help explain some of the changes in crime rates and that is why my research contains 36 different age, sex, and race variables. The most important factors though are the police via arrest rates followed by conviction rates and prison sentences. In terms of a cost-benefit basis concealed handguns are extremely important, but their absolute impact is smaller than for law enforcement.

By the way, Tom Sowell is a former professor of mine.

Best,

John

 

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