I was reading the article from the Pew research on recent poll numbers, and was wondering if anyone knew if national crime stats have actually gone down? (Reflecting the impression that the poll indicates.) My guess is they haven’t. I’m lost in other projects at the moment, but would be curious if anyone has good sources or knowledge on this?
The National Crime Victimization Survey is conducted by the Census Bureau by interviewing randomly selected households. It gathers information on crimes not reported to the police, and the reporting rate.
It’s probable that people being afraid to talk to anyone who works for the government will affect its results, but it does have some hedges against that, such as enrolling households for a three year span.