Thursday, February 24, 2022
San Francisco: As bad as they say?
It has become a media staple: stories like this one profiling how San Francisco has just gone all to hell and is principally occupied now by addicts who poop all over.
I haven't been to San Franciso in a while, but I have trouble believing that things are really that bad. Certainly, there is a challenge there with a homeless population partly displaced by high rents and people on the streets with mental illness or addiction issues. But it is hardly dangerous, relative to other cities. It's not even in the top 20 for murder rate, for example. (You want dangerous? That would be St. Louis or even Indianapolis, both located in red states-- and both of which have far higher crime rates than San Francisco).
The focus on anecdote rather than data is especially prevalent in stories like this, some of which seem to be trying to blame imaginary high crime on liberal policies.
The sad truth is that we don't seem to understand very well what makes crime rise or fall. I really wish that wasn't true, but that's reality. At the least, though, we could stop pretending that crime in the aggregate is worst in places like San Francisco.
