A study published in the November 2022 issue of the JAMA Network showed marked disparities in firearm homicides, with black males victimized at a rate last reached in the mid-1990s—a rate that (at almost 60 per 100,000) is close to ten times higher than that of white males. In New York City, 97 percent of shooting victims were either black or Hispanic in 2021; yet those minority groups constituted only slightly more than half of the city’s estimated 2021 population. One would think that disparities of this magnitude would concern a party that brands itself a defender of “equity.”
So, what does this all mean?
In the short run, American cities can probably expect a few more years of declining quality of life—particularly in places that can least afford further setbacks. In the early 1990s, when the country seemed to resign itself to rampant crime and disorder as just part of urban life, it took New York City to demonstrate that change was not only necessary, but possible. The city declared—through a fed-up citizenry, a tough-on-crime mayor, and a legendary police commissioner—that it was going to restore order. What followed was a nearly three-decade period of crime declines and urban flourishing.
New York is apparently not yet ready (or willing) to lead the way in this new fight against an old foe. If New York, or New Yorkers, won’t, then someone else must. Who will it be?
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