Crime & Leadishment

[marcusmarcusrc]

An interesting paper was brought to my attention today... remember the whole freakonomics thing about linking abortion rates to violent crime reductions 20 years later? Well, apparently, there may be another factor at work in the crime rate decreases of the past 2 decades: lead abatement

Comments

[remcat]

Hmmmm maybe lead damage leads to poor inhibition, thus the violent crime? Violent crime seems more like an impulse control thing. I have a hard time imagining lots of people planning to beat someone senseless after mugging them, but an easy time imagining people planning to break in to a house.

Also, isn't it true that most murders are personal? That is to say, the killer is most cases knows the victim and has a personal reason to kill them? I think it follows that stressful lives (unemployment) might trigger off a murder...

[puffy_wuffy]

I think property crime and murder are usually somewhat premeditated: so its possible that these are 'unleaded' crimes that are dependent on variables like "is there stuff to steal?" and "do I hate that person?" instead of "hit stuff!"