Mostly. There's been a sizeable blip up during the pandemic (it's unknown if that's the cause) and that's led to talking heads talking about "the greatest rise in crime in 50 years", but that's talking about the percent increase year-over-year, and it's been trending down for a while. It's still below the rates it was at in the 1990s, which was lower than the rates in the 1970's and 1980's.
The analogy would be if you owned MySpace stock (I know, it's not public) since 1999. Sure, maybe it shot up 20% this year, but who cares you're still out most of your money.
Current trend last the few years is to be soft on crime. So now crime rates are rising.
There is also increasing shift away from the mindset that one has the right to defend oneself. Both as a private citizen and as a police officer.
If someone comes up and pulls a knife on you, and you pull a gun out. The results can be anywhere from being treated as hero to a villain. For sides of the confrontation.
People who decide to get kids will always be more likely to do so when they can actually support them.
People who get kids by accident (or even against their will) will be more likely to put kids into unstable environments.
Kids in unstable environments are more likely to grow into adults that do crime.
One way of avoiding these kids is abortions. But you could also provide stable environments for kids that are actually born (which is very much what we in Europe did). Allowing abortions won't change a lot in a society that already does what it can to support all children and their parents — it however will change a lot in societies without social security.
I am not saying abortion doesn't have an impact, but Roe vs Wade did not. There were a lot of abortions prior to the legalization in the US. I am not positive, but it may have been legal in some states just not nationally (didn't want to look it up to confirm).
This is why the date of legalization of abortion did not seem to have an impact in Europe and also why restrictions on abortion in some countries did not have an impact.
> documented abortions rose sharply in the wake of Roe, from under 750,000 in 1973 (when live births totaled 3.1 million) to over 1.6 million in 1980 (when live births totaled 3.6 million). If illegal abortions were already being performed in equivalent numbers, one would not expect a seven-year lag in reaching a steady state. Moreover, the costs of an abortion — financial and otherwise —dropped considerably after legalization.
You are correct some states were legal earlier. Donohue and Levitt have a section on that in a 2019 follow up paper [2]. Claim: Crime dropped earlier in those states that legalized earlier.
[1] http://pricetheory.uchicago.edu/levitt/Papers/DonohueLevittT...
[2] https://bfi.uchicago.edu/wp-content/uploads/BFI_WP_201975.pd...
This is why the date of legalization of abortion did not seem to have an impact in Europe and also why restrictions on abortion in some countries did not have an impact.
If you have evidence I'd be happy to evaluate it.
The relationship between leaded gasoline and crime has been found consistent in every country that's been looked at, based on when leaded gasoline was legalized and then banned.
Not in anything like the quantities it used to be when it's use wasn't as restricted as it is now (and, with use dropping, so did blood levels; this has been extensively studied.)
But isn't the more interesting question how and why the crime rate is the way it is? Anyone who is actually interested in changing the impact crime has on a society has to look long and hard at those questions. Of course many also just take the topic as a political vehicle to reach other goals, that have nothing to do with actually making things better.
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/10/27/what-we-kno...
https://heyjackass.com/2022-homicide-trend/
More interesting info on the main page: