Your search for: subjects:"Violent Crimes United States"

In Crime is Not the Problem, Franklin Zimring and Gordon Hawkins revolutionize the way we think about crime and violence--by forcing us to distinguish between crime and violence. The authors reveal that compared to other industrialized nations, in most categories of nonviolent crime, American crime ...

In Crime is Not the Problem, Franklin Zimring and Gordon Hawkins revolutionize the way we think about crime and violence--by forcing us to distinguish between crime and violence. The authors reveal that compared to other industrialized nations, in most categories of nonviolent crime, American crime rates are comparable--even lower, in some cases. Only when it comes to lethal violence does the United States outpace other Western nations, with homicide rates many, many times greater. London and New York City have nearly the same number of robberies and burglaries each year, but robbers and burglars kill 54 victims in New York for every victim death in London. Why are the risks so much greater that victims will be killed or maimed in the United States? And what can be done to bring the death rate from American violence down to tolerable levels? The authors show how the impact of television and movie violence on rates of homicide is wildly overrated, but emphasize the paramount importance of guns. By making the crucial distinction between lethal violence and crime in general, the authors clear the ground for a targeted, far more effective response to the real crisis in American society. Crime is Not the Problem will reshape the debate about crime control in the United States.

100 billion dollars. That is the annual cost of gun violence in America according to the authors of this landmark study, a book destined to change the way Americans view the problem of gun-related violence. Until now researchers have assessed the burden imposed by gunshot injuries and deaths in ...

100 billion dollars. That is the annual cost of gun violence in America according to the authors of this landmark study, a book destined to change the way Americans view the problem of gun-related violence. Until now researchers have assessed the burden imposed by gunshot injuries and deaths in terms of medical costs and lost productivity. Here, economists Philip Cook and Jens Ludwig widen the lens, developing a framework to calculate the full costs borne by Americans in a society where both gun violence and its ever-present threat mandate responses that touch every aspect of our lives. All of us, no matter where we reside or how we live, share the costs of gun violence. Whether waiting in line to pass through airport security or paying taxes for the protection of public officials; whether buying a transparent book bag for our children to meet their school's post-Columbine regulations or subsidizing an urban trauma center, the steps we take are many and the expenditures enormous. Cook and Ludwig reveal that investments in prevention, avoidance, and harm reduction, both public and private, constitute a far greater share of the gun-violence burden than previously recognized. They also employ extensive survey data to measure the subjective costs of living in a society where there is risk of being shot or losing a loved one or neighbor to gunfire. At the same time, they demonstrate that the problem of gun violence is not intractable. Their review of the available evidence suggests that there are both additional gun regulations and targeted law enforcement measures that will help. This urgently needed book documents for the first time how gun violence diminishes the quality of life for everyone in America. In doing so, it will move the debate over gun violence past symbolic politics to a direct engagement with the costs and benefits of policies that hold promise for reducing gun violence and may even pay for themselves.