Explaining Recent Trends in U.S. Homicide Rates

• NCJ Number: 190238
• Journal: Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology Volume: 88 Issue: 4 Dated: Summer 1998 Pages: 1175-1216
• Author(s): Alfred Blumstein; Richard Rosenfeld
• Date Published: 1998
• Length: 42 pages
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Report (Study/Research)
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This paper examined factors involved in the decline in the U.S. homicide rate since the mid-1990's and focused on those factors whose effects were reasonably measurable and where aggregates may present a misleading picture of the homicide rate.

Abstract

During the past decade, the homicide rate in the United States experienced sharp swings. Since 1993, the homicide rate has seen sharp declines. This decline has been met with mixed feelings and widespread interest in the factors involved in the decline. In this study certain factors were explored and effects measured to determine if summations presented a less than accurate picture of the homicide rate. It was viewed that the recent change in the aggregate homicide rate was a product of several distinct subgroup trends. Credible conclusions must make sense of multiple, interactive, and sometimes countervailing influences. This study examined and reviewed several factors: age, demographic composition, weapons, drug markets, incarceration effects, economic expansion, domestic assault, police programs, and community efforts. Findings indicated that numerous factors contributed to the decline in homicides over the past several years. A significant aspect of the improvement in homicide rates involved undoing the factors that contributed to the growth in the late 1980's in particular youth carrying and using guns. Efforts to reduce this growth factor were made by both police and community groups. The decline may also be attributable to incapacitation, with the doubling of the incarceration rate since 1985. This was reflected only in older individuals, not young people. Current economic conditions seem to have provided legitimate economic opportunities and at the same time the opportunities in the illicit drug markets were diminished. The reversal of this decline was recognized with the potential resurgence of active drug markets and the violence that could accompany them through a downturn in the economy and the impact it would have on the communities. A recommendation was made to fashion criminal justice and community-based policies to prepare for the next increase. Graphs