It's definitely a good day when a liberal columnist takes The New York Times to task for being so surprised that violent crime is now at nearly a 40-year low despite the recession followed by a very weak recovery:. Says Richard Cohen:
The paper's evident surprise at the falling crime rate shows a remarkable tenacity to cling to shopworn and disproved dogma. Crime is not committed by good people who lose their jobs. It is committed by criminals who never had a real job in the first place.
Hardships don't create criminals, in other words; criminals create hardships. Cohen goes on to say that the drop in crime is "indeed newsworthy" and "a bit mysterious," but he actually starts zeroing in on two important factors a lot of crime-watchers agree on: many more police on the street, with the obvious deterrent effects; and the aging population. Crime is mostly a young person's pursuit, and there is just a smaller percentage today of the high-risk 15-to-29 group. Sometimes explanations are a lot simpler than we think they are.
