"Criminologist Conklin believes that two statistics in particular--median age and the unemployment rate--help explain the ebb and flow of crime. Violence is typically a young man's vice; it has been said that the most effective crime-fighting tool is a 30th birthday. The arrival of teenage baby boomers in the 1960s coincided with a rise in crime, and rates have declined as America has grown older. The median age in 1990, near the peak of the crime wave, was 32, according to Conklin. A decade later, it was over 35. Today, it is 36-plus. (It is also true that today's young men are less prone to crime. The juvenile crime rate in 2007, the most recent available, was the lowest in at least a generation.)
So not only did teenage baby boomers increase the crime rate, but non-baby boomer teenagers are more law-abiding. Interesting ...
Posts: 2432 | Location: TDCAA | Registered: March 08, 2002
OK, in the past three years, the prison population has indeed decreased, as several states, most notably California, have reduced their prison population. So now, the evidence -- the BJS figures released this morning -- is in.
