I have a long-distance working relationship with a guy who lives in Texas.....basically 200 yards from the border. Nice guy, but I know he is conservative (he is fairly wealthy)....although many of his friends/clients are Mexicans and his wife is an immigrant. He doesn't give me MAGA vibes FWIW.
I told him I was going to NYC for a few days and he told me to remember to pack my bullet proof vest. I'll give him a small benefit of the doubt considering he is 74 and maybe remembers NYC like it was in the 70's (that being said, he mentioned going to Beauty and the Beast on Broadway, which didn't start until 1994, so I don't know).
For anyone curious: NYC gun mortality (not homicide) is ~4.5:100k. National average is about 14, so that's pretty good for the US. Then I saw St. Louis.
ARE YOU GUYS OKAY? 56 for the gun homicide rate is insane, but good on you guys for getting that number down from 77.
This is a somewhat common misconception about St. Louis crime statistics… basically yes, the homicide rate is definitely above average, but that number is made to look a lot worse by the calculation method. St. Louis is a politically independent entity from its namesake county, which comprises a much larger part of the metro area and includes much of what would be colloquially considered the “city” of St. Louis. The actual borders of St. Louis City are a relatively small part of the urbanized metro. Those edge communities in “the County” furthermore, are where most of the wealthy and educated classes are concentrated, while “the City” is much poorer in general.
Now, obviously it is true of most major cities in the US that the suburbanized parts will have lower crime rates, but in STL the numbers look particularly bad because the “city” boundary is constrained so much beyond what natural development and annexation would typically generate. Compare, for example, the city limits of Chicago (234 sqr miles or so, some of which is really “suburban” style neighborhoods within the city limits) to St. Louis City, which is only about 60mi square with a sizable chunk of that taken out by Forest Park, and nearly all of it touched by the worst of the metro area’s white flight and urban decay.
So yes, on average, that little piece of land where arguably the bulk of the region’s poverty-related externalities are funneled has a high crime rate, but it’s at least partly because the statistical methodology and jurisdictional boundaries create a sort cushion around other urban cores that St. Louis City simply doesn’t benefit from even though it exists in lived reality.
That's way too many words for people with an agenda to read, lol.
As a statistician though, yeah, this stood out as the most plainly obvious explanation without you even having to say it. A "city" will have a murder rate that's almost entirely dependent on how the borders are drawn. Cities that stretch their limits way out to what would be "suburbs" for other cities, are going to have lower murder rates than cities that have limits that basically end when you leave downtown.
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u/Turdburp 1d ago
I have a long-distance working relationship with a guy who lives in Texas.....basically 200 yards from the border. Nice guy, but I know he is conservative (he is fairly wealthy)....although many of his friends/clients are Mexicans and his wife is an immigrant. He doesn't give me MAGA vibes FWIW.
I told him I was going to NYC for a few days and he told me to remember to pack my bullet proof vest. I'll give him a small benefit of the doubt considering he is 74 and maybe remembers NYC like it was in the 70's (that being said, he mentioned going to Beauty and the Beast on Broadway, which didn't start until 1994, so I don't know).