I was talking to a friend this weekend about how America's crime rates are going to substantially rise.
America already had crime rates significantly above the first / developed world, but it was still a fairly safe country overall.
Several factors will make America less safe in coming years:
Fewer families: 40% of American children are bastards and kids raised without a stable family are more likely to commit crime. The majority of poor and minority kids, already more likely to be criminal, are bastards. In 1965 76% of black kids were born into married families. Today that number is in the teens. (FYI the stats for whites are only about 30 years ahead of those for blacks)
More integration: While crime is higher in poor neighborhoods, in a poor neighborhood, everyone is in the same situation--struggling to get by, and whether it is "honor amongst thieves" or just they are more likely to get caught when committing crimes in a neighborhood where everyone knows them, there is at least some reluctance to rob your neighbor. If you integrate minorities into wealthy white neighborhoods, this is a target rich environment for them and they will go to town on the robin and rapin.
Prison and Legal reforms: While our system is highly corrupt, incarcerates more of its citizens than any nation on earth, and is desperate need of change, I'm afraid the changes will be more along the lines of what we have seen lately: releasing felons from prison early, failure to prosecute crimes, not allowing police to use certain tactics like stop and frisk.
More diversity: As Robert Putnam reluctantly discovered in writing Bowling Alone, more diversity makes everyone in the community less social, less cohesive, and less trusting.
More poverty: The middle class has been disappearing for years, and this is only accelerating. Robert Reich (Clinton labor secretary) made a good documentary on this recently.
Welfare and social service cuts: This one is the most speculative, and also the most dangerous. I think it very likely that we will no longer be able to afford the social service assistance to the poor to the degree we do today. America has been declining in terms of wealth and power since the 1960s and the US dollar reserve currency is going to end one day. Benefits and welfare for the poor is one of the only things keeping them from behaving the way they do in Brazil or Africa. Remember, whites will be a minority in just a decade or two, and the ability to offer the generous benefits we have today will be in question.
Cultural change: South Africa was wealthy and had excellent infrastructure and legal systems that enforced public safety. Today it is so dangerous that neighborhoods have security guards posted on every block, 24/7. Those running the courts and legal system have a much different mentality than their predecessors. In my city, the majority of judges and city officials are now minority, when they were all white in my parents time. They will make different decisions, and have different values. Many of them are open to the idea that crime is caused by racism, which will be used to excuse criminals from their behavior simply because white people disapprove of their criminality.
