Crime Reduction Linked To Lead-Free Gasoline

Hugh Pickens writes "Even low levels of lead can cause brain damage, increasing the likelihood of behavioral and cognitive traits such as impulsivity, aggressiveness, and low IQ that are strongly linked with criminal behavior. The NYTimes has a story on how the phasing out of leaded gasoline starting with the Clean Air Act in 1973 may have led to a 56% drop in violent crime in the US in the 1990s. An economics professor at Amherst College, Jessica Wolpaw Reyes, discovered the connection and wrote a paper comparing the reduction of lead from gasoline between states (PDF) and the reduction of violent crime. She constructed a table linking crime rates in every state to childhood lead exposure in that state 20 or 30 years earlier. If lead poisoning is a factor in the development of criminal behavior, then countries that didn't switch to unleaded fuel until the 1980s, like Britain and Australia, should soon see a dip in crime as the last lead-damaged children outgrow their most violent years."

Comments

Knife slices both ways

[everphilski]

I'd like to know if forcing your beliefs on other people is worth twice as much crime? Is making cheaper, more effective paint worth twice as much crime?

You mention that abortion might be linked to a lowering in crime. I'd like to mention another fact, that abortion is a proven risk factor in breast cancer.

Irrelevant, you may say, but it is another instance of 'forcing beliefs', but from the other side of the coin:

The American Cancer Society, the National Cancer Institute and the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation continue to deny the link between induced abortion and an increased risk of breast cancer. They make no effort to publicize (or they wholly ignore) the increased risk of breast cancer associated with oral contraceptive use. link.

Many of these groups are promoting their own beliefs that an abortion is an important right over the free flow of information (and oral contraceptives), letting women know that it increases their risk factor for the second most fatal form of cancer, according to the ACS. The knife slices both ways, and people die in both cases.

Re:McStats: Funny, not Biotech!

[Muttley]

Here's where you can actually hear them telling you they are idiots: from TF paper:

Putting the pieces together, the long story is approximately as follows. From 1972 to 1992, violent crime rose 83%: increasing lead exposure produced a 28-91% increase, the growth of prisons produced a 35% decrease, and a remaining 24-87% increase remains unexplained. From 1992 to 2002, violent crime dropped 34%: declining lead exposure produced a 56% decrease, legalized abortion produced a 29% decrease, other factors produced a 23% decrease, and a remaining 74% increase remains unexplained. Thus, the current results imply that lead exposure was likely an important factor in both the rise and the decline of violent crime in the last 30 years. At the same time, the recent history of violent crime is not fully understood: a sustained rise in crime of about 3-5% annually remains unexplained.

I would argue that prisons did not produce a 35% decrease, given that the prison population has more than doubled during this period, but nearly all of these numbers are made up; even if they aren't, then they accept that there is a remaining 74% increase unaccounted for. How can they be even remotely certain that lead is responsible for the highly precise 28-91% If you aren't convinced they are idiots try this for size:

By the year 2020, when the effects of the Clean Air Act and Roe v. Wade would be complete, violent crime could be as much as 70% lower than it would be if lead had remained in gasoline, and as much as 35-45% lower than it would be if abortion had never been legalized. At the same time, history suggests that other unknown factors would have increased crime by perhaps 3-5% per year.

What serious researcher writes like this? Another gem for those who care:

The effect on IQ has been debated extensively, but the consensus is that an increase in blood lead level of 1 g/dL produces a decrease of approximately one-half of an IQ point, without any safe threshold

Re:Civil Rights Generation

[Doc Ruby]

Sadly, your mother didn't opt for abortion.

Re:Civil Rights Generation

[Doc Ruby]

Tell me about all the children you've adopted, to stop this "wholesale murder". Especially all the ones from the 400,000 thrown in the trash every year by fertility clinics. Or just where you occasionally send a check or volunteer to help those children.