10 Most Violent States In The U.S.: The Institute For Economics And Peace

We've all heard that crime doesn't pay. Peace, it turns out, just might.

The newest edition of the U.S. Peace Index, developed by the Institute for Economics and Peace, ranks states by level of peacefulness. The index is based on five primary indicators: (1) number of homicides per 100,000 people, (2) number of violent crimes per 100,000 people, (3) number of people in jail per 100,000 people, (4) number of police officers per 100,000 people and (5) general availability of small arms.

Combining these figures, the U.S. Peace Index calculates a number summarizing the overall peacefulness of each state, with low numbers being safer. Currently, the national average is 2.056.

Since 1995, the U.S. has become 8 percent safe, according to the index. Not all states have improved, though. New York's become 32.3 percent safer since 1991, but other states have actually become more dangerous, like North Dakota (47.7 percent more dangerous) and Tennessee (9.3 percent more dangerous). Generally, Southern states tended to be the least safe, with the region scoring 3.13 on the index, compared with the Northeast, calculated to be the safest region with a score of 1.99.

Reducing crime seems to have more benefits than just an increased sense of well-being, too, with the index's authors hinting that safety might have notable economic benefits. If the United States peace index was as low as Canada's (1.392 compared to 2.056), for example, the U.S. Peace Index's authors argue that state governments could save up to $89 billion in incarceration, medical, judicial and policing costs. Add to that an increase in nationwide productivity equivalent to a $272 billion stimulus, as well as 2.7 million newly-created jobs, and it starts to become pretty clear: peace pays.

Indicators are weighted, allowing homicides to carry the greatest significance, while availability of firearms carries the least. The index also groups into four categories an additional 37 secondary factors like high school graduation rate and median income: politics and demographics, education, health and economic conditions.

Below is the list of the 10 least peaceful states in the United States according to the Institute for Economics and Peace.

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10. Maryland

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United States Peace Index: 3.24 Percentage Change Since 1991: 18.2 percent more safe Total Cost Of Crime Per Person: $1,749

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United States Peace Index: 3.24
Percentage Change Since 1991: 18.2 percent more safe
Total Cost Of Crime Per Person: $1,749

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Most Surprisingly Violent States

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Comments

[Dorothy DeAvila]

10:03 AM on 05/23/2011

Interesting! Most violent states are the Republican dominated South. When you keep the people poor.....you have violence.....when you don't provide jobs ....you have poverty and crime. More opportunities in Blue states, as people are better educated.

[Jo Le Tiel]

05:02 PM on 05/17/2011

Funny, I was looking for New Jersey - so the South takes the bloodied cake, eh?

[nutbagger]

01:03 PM on 05/16/2011

For the record, I see that I was unfanned due to my spat with Jacob, on behalf of everyone else in the world I say, thank you. I don't need fans - please everyone who has fanned pleased undo it. Oh yeah, FKUJACOB and Corey.

[nutbagger]

04:10 PM on 05/13/2011

and...FKUTUHUFFPST

[nutbagger]

12:00 PM on 05/11/2011

I'm changing my moniker to something a little more "yiddish" so I can say whatever I want on this blog like JacobIsreal and the mods will let all my comments come through.

[nutbagger]

11:55 AM on 05/11/2011

I think I should change my moniker to something a little more "yiddish" and then maybe I can be just like JacobIsreal.

[nutbagger]

11:54 AM on 05/11/2011

I would like to know why JacobIsreal's comments are coming through loud and clear. What a razist country we live in. It's really sad.

[jacobisrael]

01:20 PM on 05/12/2011

Rather than issuing ad hominems like "you're a fool", why don't you try a different tactic, like pointing out exactly what you think the error is, or sticking to the subject? Perhaps if you address a specific issue or cite a source which supports your differing opinion, moderators won't censor you so much (though they did allow "you're a fool" to get through). What did you say that was worthy of censorship, if THAT isn't?

[Greg Jordan]

10:44 AM on 05/11/2011

They are all in the religious South except for Nevada, and it harkens back to the Wild West days. So what does that say about our churched betheren?? I think religion is the worst mental illness inflicting our country today and it's never going to be controlled. There's a difference between it and the teachings of Christ but most people don't get it.

[keywest4899]

08:40 AM on 05/14/2011

Just because its in the "religious south" (that moniker comes from the lame stream leftist media), does not mean they are mostly conservatives. In fact the south contains a high portion of blacks, latinos etc who are the base of the lib party.

[SuburbiaAwaken]

12:01 AM on 05/17/2011

keywest republican hmmmm..................

[larrykat]

07:20 PM on 05/01/2011

The only one mildly surprising is Maryland. The others have the majority of all the redneck religious people in the country. Congratulations, Dixie!

[jacobisrael]

06:20 PM on 05/02/2011

The Southern States also have many Blacks. If you removed just the crimes commited just by Blacks, they would be the safest states, just as North Dakota is today.

AND almost all the crimes in North Dakota can be traced directly to the half a percent of Blacks who are there.

They also dinged the Southern States for their high ownership of firearms, even though the murder rates in states is inversely proportional to the percentage of gun ownership: for you liberals, the more guns available, the lower the crime.

[Alexis Phelps]

02:38 PM on 05/04/2011

ummmmm white people can be violent too

[DlJack]

10:40 PM on 05/06/2011

yea its not a race thing more of a cultural thing in the south. ive looked through this post and it seems as if you exclusively blame african americans but if that was the case there would be a mixture of states form different regions not just the south also in those states african americans are the minority. yea so race warfare isnt going to cut it here, its just that the south is dominated by republicans who believe that a lose gun control laws lead to a safer society well this survey proves other wise. despite what u want crime does transcend race.

[artmfa]

11:46 AM on 05/04/2011

Really? Maryland surprising? Did you not watch "The Wire"? BASED on REALITY.

[larrykat]

12:02 PM on 05/04/2011

No, I couldn't take more than 5 minutes of "The Wire". Boooring. I prefer John Water's views of Baltimore and Maryland.

[southpawman]

06:20 PM on 05/01/2011

There are probably more religious people in those states also

[jacobisrael]

01:21 PM on 05/07/2011

It depends on which religion you're referring to, right? Aren't there vastly different social pathologies between the mostly Catholic states and the mostly Protestant states? F'rinstance, the murder rates in mostly Catholic states like New York, Pennsylvania and Illinois is 6 per 100k, compared to as low as 0.2 per 100k in mostly Protestant states like North Dakota.

This is a THIRTY FOLD difference from state to state, right?

[Str84Ward]

02:30 PM on 04/23/2011

We have the death penalty. We have Charles Manson's entertainment tonight clips when he has a parole hearing. Can we get some massive express lanes on death rows ? Money saved for housing thousands of societies horror's might actually be spent housing homeless at the very least ? Ewww.. that would be too politically nuts to actually DO.

[DaveNYC]

09:35 PM on 04/22/2011

An interesting report, but I question the methodology some: "The index is based on five primary indicators: (1) number of homicides per 100,000 people, (2) number of violent crimes per 100,000 people, (3) number of people in jail per 100,000 people, (4) number of police officers per 100,000 people and (5) general availability of small arms." Shouldn't it just look at (1) and (2)? Factors (3) through (5) are (at best) only indirectly relevant to the issue of the level of violence. A state might have low violent crime rates, but high drug usage and harsh drug penalties, and hence a high rate of incarceration. A state might have low violent crime rates, and for that reason also have a relatively low proportion of law enforcement officers. The inclusion of a measure of the "availability of small arms" raises a whole host of issues . . . not least of which is, how is this even measured in the first place?

It says they also considered a number of secondary factors. While it might be interesting to see the extent to which ALL of these factors correlate with the overall rate of violence, it seems troubling to use those factors to determine the overall rate of violence. The rate of violence is a straightforward thing: number of violent acts / population = rate of violence.

[jacobisrael]

03:16 PM on 04/23/2011

It would be bad enough if they linked the availability of small arms ONLYwith suicide rates, and ignored the inverse relationship with homicide rates. But they don't even do that. Instead, the linked it with the *percent* of suicides which involved guns (small arms), while literally ignoring the actual suicide RATES.

Two simple examples: Washington, DC, which they estimate at 5% ownership of small arms, and North Dakota which they estimate has 10 times as many guns per capita (55%), are also on opposite ends of the spectrum in crime rates.

To make it simpler, at one point in recent history, the murder RATE in DC was 81 per 100,000 population, which was 405 TIMES greater than North Dakota, at 0.2. Focusing only on these two "states", we might believe that their are 8 fewer murders per 100k for each 1% increase in the availability of small arms.

This happens to be generally consistent with other studies, state to state, and country to country.

[AverageJill]

07:20 PM on 04/22/2011

Baltimore needs another William Donald Schaefer! There was never another mayor like him before him or since.

William Donald Schaefer died this week of pneumonia at the age of 89.

[jacobisrael]

07:05 PM on 04/22/2011

There are many, many reasons I disagree with the statement “The reasons (multiple) that we are a violent society can generally be grouped into four areas: Education, Ethics, Economics, and the Glorificat­ion of Violence. Address these and lower the violent crime rates and the homicide rates will drop accordingl­y.”

I don't think any nation has ever spent more per student for "education", only to get such poor results. But I don't even blame our record high violence rates on our record low education performance. And I don't know a single person who I think has been adversely affected by “the Glorificat­ion of Violence".

There are entire states, entire cities, which have never "achieved" the results we see in Detroit, and New Orleans, and Gary, Indiana, BECAUSE the people there have not been sucked into the same con games that these high crime rate cities have been sucked into, and most likely never will. I'm in a county of 4 million which has experienced almost none of this, and a city of 80 thousand which has seen only 1 murder in the last five years (which was not even committed by any of the residents).

[oarfish]

07:06 PM on 05/01/2011

and our prison systems don't do a good enough job at rehabilitation and preparing convicts for life once they get out of prison. i think the us has a high recitivism rate

[Waltfl]

09:03 AM on 04/22/2011

Florida made # 4. Don't draw false conclusions. All this is only because of all them illegals and because of these daumn libruls. Once we get open carry restored, we'll be doing much better. Like # 5 or # 6 out of 50 States.