>We didn’t report the theft; why bother?

Unless you're saying that people in New York disproportionately don't report crime that doesn't change much about the rankings. And also having lived very rural and very urban my intuition is that there is significantly more unreported law-breaking in the countryside (sometimes for the mundane reason that there barely is police in the first place).

> Unless you're saying that people in New York disproportionately don't report crime that doesn't change much about the rankings.

People in New York don’t report crime that disproportionately occurs in places like New York.

People in New York disproportionately don't report crime, because there's so much, and so little chance of effective investigation/prosecution/recovery, they have better things to do. It's just a cost of the city's other benefits.

> People in New York disproportionately don't report crime,

How do you know it is disproportionately? I live in a suburb (not in NY) and I've never reported petty theft. What would be the point? Police isn't going to do anything about it.

It would be fantastic to have evidence that substantiates this claim.

Here's an experiment you should try, since you claimed to never have anything stolen. Buy a bike, any bike, and one of those cable locks. Lock it on a public street and leave it for 8 hours during the day. Then see if it's still there at the end of the day.

I guarantee you it won't.

I'm sorry, but what? Do you seriously believe that there's some kind of omnipotent bike theft ring in NYC, poaching bikes as soon as they're locked up?

I rode my bike to high school (in a "bad" neighborhood) regularly, and locked it outside with a regular cable lock. It was never stolen. When I got a job, I locked my bike up with the same cable lock for months, until I got access to the bike room. Never stolen.

Bike theft does happen here; I know people who have had bikes stolen. But it's not particularly common, even given the rise in expensive e-bikes.

You’re either woefully confused, blatantly lying, or have lived an incredibly and uniquely sheltered existence in some sort of enclave of wealth and privilege.

> Do you seriously believe that there's some kind of omnipotent bike theft ring in NYC, poaching bikes as soon as they're locked up?

Literally yes. Do you even actually live in NYC?

Does Bloomingdale count as an “enclave of wealth and privilege”? It wasn’t considered the safest neighborhood when I was growing up, but it’s considered very safe now. I don’t know what to tell you: I went to public schools here, have rode my bike my whole life, have rode the subway independently my entire life, &c. &c.. The “worst” thing that’s happened to me is being bugged for money on the street.

I’m not blind to some advantages I have: I’m tall, have a large frame, and a deep voice. But I was also a little kid for the first 18 years I was here, and nothing bad ever happened to me.

Yes, I really do live here. And yes, there are bike theft rings. But they’re not omnipotent, and they’re fundamentally opportunistic; I’ve never had any issues with any bike I’ve owned being stolen, and neither has anybody else in my family.

If Bloomingdale is the same Bloomingdale Google Maps tells me is in the middle of Manhattan and 2 blocks from Central Park NYC, yes, it is an enclave of wealth and privilege. Try riding your bike around the Bronx some time, it'll broaden your world view.

> I went to public schools here

There's a world of difference between a public school in a wealthy area and one in a shitty one. The former might as well be a private school in terms of the quality of instruction and available funding from PTA donations.

Indeed. But do those most responsible, such as local officials, really want to know, if a sort of learned-helplessness in residents has created an illusion of being safer than reality?

You can be absolutely positive that the NYPD knows that it's in their best interest for crime rates to appear as high as possible.

Ok. Leave your cellphone outside in NYC for 4 hours tomorrow during the day.

I'll do the same in my small midwestern town.

We can repeat this experiment until you run out of money.

This is a ridiculous sampling error. If as many people passed by your phone in your small midwestern town as do in my densely populated neighborhood, I suspect it would be stolen.

That's why we use per capita statics.

At the end of your day: your cell phone will be stolen.

My cell phone: will be returned by my neighbor.

I'll take the "bias" in the numbers all day lol

I realize you have the scientific high ground here but from a pragmatic viewpoint of anyone who's lived in both the country and the city, it almost sounds comical to hear someone say this.

Edit: And in no time someone chimes in about their safe life they currently live in Tokyo, Japan -- probably the safest large city in in the entire world and one if if not the safest country in the world. Hope y'all have your visas ready. Of course we know this is in bad faith, because the Japanese analogy would be to compare Tokyo to rural Japan not to small town America.

Except that it's not comical. I've lived in both, and I've experienced way more crime in my life in the country than in the city. In the country, we didn't report neighbor disputes because we didn't want them to murder us in our sleep, because we ratted them out to the police. We have a neighbor kill one of our dogs (by feeding it antifreeze), we had them threaten us with guns on our own property (which, obviously is why we were worried they'd kill us in our sleep). We had property stolen numerous times. There were always trespassers in our woods. There was a hit and run on the street in front of us (we did actually report that). We had constant problems with meth heads. This wasn't in some crazy backwoods filled with trailer parks. It was relatively affluent (for the country).

My brother lives in a small town, and kids in his neighborhood shot their kids with BB guns. They have issues with neighbors leaving their dogs off leash and attacking their dogs. They've had people from the neighborhood try to run them off the road. None of these things get reported to the police, because the police won't do anything, and you'll start a crazy feud with the neighbors. You don't hear about family feuds in the city, but they're a constant in small towns and can last generations.

I've lived in New Orleans, NYC, SF, and Tokyo, and other than New Orleans, I'd say every place has felt safer than when I lived in small towns or the country when I was growing up.

Sounds like a single day in the city. Rather than people just threatening with guns, they just actually pointed guns at my head and tried to rob me. At least in the country it was legal for me to carry and point back. If that's all you got from a lifetime in the country it sound like a joke to time spent in the city.

I've never been robbed in the city (I have in the suburbs). I've never been burglarized in the city (I have in a small town). I've never had a gun pointed at me in the city (I have in a small town).

Most cities, especially nowadays, are quite safe. I think small towns are generally also safe, but from my personal experience, I've found the country to be less safe than cities because you're effectively on your own.

Perhaps then safety depends on personality styles. I much prefer to be on my own, and don't mind arranging for my own defense. The thought of depending on police for that function terrifies me, particularly after Supreme Court rulings that effectively state they have no duty to protect you.

I think perhaps the city is safer for people who solve things by reporting problems to authority, whereas country is safer for those who rely on themselves. If you live in rural areas and depend on police for anything other than helping get the word out and possibly picking up someone after the fact, you are just fucked.

> The numbers do lie, though.

Really?

> When I first moved to NYC, it was a wet, slushy winter. My wife left her shoes outside our apartment door to dry off overnight, in a locked building with about 12 other units.

I kinda feel sorry for your wife shoes, but personally I wouldn't even list that in theft: unless you live in Japan, yes, things left outside your house DO tend to vanish, especially if left overnight!

> The next four years in NYC weren’t all that different; lots of petty theft and crime, all the time, everywhere. Unreported and unresolved.

Can you please share more? Because our definitions of theft seem so different that I seriously wonder what you call crime.

Personally, I've always felt safe in NYC and NJ. Oh god I miss the good food from Palisades Park...

> These days, I live in the mountains outside of Boulder

I have visited Boulder and noticed quite a few things besides the obvious like how it's not welcoming to smokers (smoking is banned everywhere). Among the disturbing ones, the police force seems to enjoy harassing the homeless. I was told about that and didn't believe it until I witnessed it with my own eyes. That's far more concerning to me to have shoes stolen outside my home.

Also, people felt kinda fake? As in, lots of virtue signaling, but I felt uneasy in a very creepy way.

It's very hard to describe. It suffices to say there's no amount of money you could pay me to live in Boulder, while NYC stills feels like home even if I don't live there anymore.

Maybe my few days of visit was just a fluke, but it's rare I've felt so bad about a city to say something as harsh.

> things left outside your house DO tend to vanish, especially if left overnight

That's quite a sad thing you've grown used to. I've lived in suburbs in several states and not one would have me saying that things left outside my house tend to vanish.

You should expect more from your fellow citizens. Not stealing is a basic decency and sending thieves to jail should be a basic tenet of society.

> personally I wouldn't even list that in theft: unless you live in Japan, yes, things left outside your house DO tend to vanish, especially if left overnight!

This is exactly analogous to blaming someone for walking home at 3am through a badly lit area while visibly having money, or being attractive and dressed to show it.

The plural of anecdote is data :-)

I've lived here my entire life, and I've never had my shoes stolen from outside my apartment, whether the building was locked or unlocked. I'm sorry that that happened to your wife, but it's a single instance.

Low-level quality of life crimes are a constant; I seriously doubt you haven’t been the victim of similar crime.

You're welcome to doubt, but it's true. I've never even had a bicycle stolen (in the city that is; someone stole one from me in the suburbs of Maryland once).

That's a bummer!

But the hustle and bustle though.