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Comment by strict9 | Hacker News Reader

No it's not. Not entirely anyway.

One thing I've learned in my decades on this planet is that just about never is one explanation for a human condition mostly correct. Lead is a convenient technical explanation that underestimates the impact of upbringing and community.

It doesn't explain a lot of factors of juvenile delinquency that existed for generations before lead service lines or leaded gasoline.

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Industry and highways and other high sources of lead pollution were built in the areas with higher juvenile delinquency. Not in rich, privileged areas. I think you can also correlate the rise in violent crime to amount of lead contamination in the soil, some articles claiming down to the city block level.

Which order did these things happen in?

Maybe industry and highways increase lead exposure which leads to crime, or maybe areas already high in crime are cheaper so that's where industry and highways go?

Specifically violent crime. Poor areas had more violent crime. These areas got dumped with more lead pollution. The rise percentage wise correlates almost perfectly with lead levels, with poor (and now polluted) areas rising more than well off areas. And then the drop, where after lead was removed from petrol you get a significant drop, but still less of a drop in areas more lead soil contamination, such of those blocks next to a highway. We know the developmental effects on young brains from lead; it is why we banned it.

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