The Decline in Crime Rates in the United States - Paper Example

The past two decades the United State has experienced dramatic deterioration in crime rate in all categories of crime and all parts of the nation. The sharp decline began in the mid-1990s reaching the lowest level in years. They occurred without warning leading experts to predict the explosion as an evanescent wave that might fade with time. This explosion led many to believe that the rise of incarceration leads to the impact; others argue that imprisonment had little to do with the fall in crime rates.

According to the articles, "The Many Causes of America's Decline in Crime."; the author argues that the rise in incarceration had a little effect on reduction of the offense in the virgin year (the 1990s), but with time this effect has produced close to no effect terming it as diminishing returns. The author argues that several other factors have proven to cause the decline, but they do not ultimately add up to the data and imprisonment stands at a very dim margin. A huge percentage remains accounted for, although researchers are still trying to figure out the huge cause of the decline decades later (Chettiar, 2015).

The article lists a few of the proven roots causes of this drop; one researcher attributed the fall to the legalization of abortion. This theory argues that unwanted kids are at a more risk for crime and two legal abortion leads to a lessening in the number of unwanted births. Legalized abortion accounted for 10 percent reduction in homicide, violent crime and property crime rate, which accounted for 25-30 percent of the observed decline in the 90s (Levitt, 2004). The second cause is the unleading of gasoline. Lead has a variety of effects on the brain that researchers have validated through hundreds of diverse biological studies. It alters the brain formation and affects the thinking and planning of an individual. Lead poisoning results to bad decisions, it effects has a time lag hence it could not be identified immediately (Casciani, 2014).

Researcher credits a small percentage to the police. (Zimring, 2012), the presence of more police officers on the street got credits for the fall in the crime rates, the addition of more cops also came with the implementation of new strategies; examples are the zero tolerance and the broken windows slogans. Lastly, although the rising in incarceration was overly credited in the fall of crime rates, it, however, played a role in that field. There are many habitual felons and people committing grave, violent crimes who may need to keep out of the society. Commonly referred to as incapacitation effect; eliminating someone from the society to avert him or her from committing more crimes (Chettiar, 2015).

(Goffrier, 2014) Deterrence is a way of crime prevention through discouraging individual conducts through threats of punishment or another expression of disapproval. They argue that prosecution and punishments of the lawbreakers can avert future crimes from recurring. This might be true for crimes violent crimes that cause disruption in the society. Placing a hefty penalty on these sectors has led to some level of decline in crimes. However, non-violent crime is not solved by deterrence; this crime can only reduce by digging at the root causes of these crimes. Therefore the rise in incarceration produces a negligible effect on crime especially in the past few years has compared to the 1990s as stated in the article. Imprisonment has a much disastrous effect on the social and economic structures of the society; these results take a long time to detect that's why they are not highly regarded.

In conclusion, reducing the crime rate in a country cannot be solved by introducing heavy punishments to the offenders or incriminating them in such a way that they cannot recover economically due to their criminal record. This problem can be solved by evaluating the cause of these crimes, especially non-violent and creating policies of cab the issue. Unemployment, mental illness, racial and environmental factors in some way leads to the outburst of prisoners in the country.

Bibliography

Casciani, D. (2014, April 21). Did removing lead from petrol spark a decline in crime? Retrieved May 10, 2017, from BBC News: http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-27067615

Chettiar, I. M. (2015, Feb 11). The Many Causes of Americas Decline in Crime. Retrieved May 10, 2017, from The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/02/the-many-causes-of-americas-decline-in-crime/385364/

Goffrier, B. (2014). Deterrence as Principle of Sentencing in International Criminal Justice. Deterrence, 1-10.

Levitt, S. D. (2004). Understanding Why Crime Fell in the 1990s: Four Factors that Explain the Decline and Six that Do Not. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 163-190.

Zimring, F. E. (2012, June 13). How New York Beat Crime. Retrieved May 10, 2017, from OUPblog: https://blog.oup.com/2012/06/zimring-scientific-american-nyc-beat-crime/