Poverty vs. Violence
Poverty and Violence
According to the National Review, “Between the years of 2008 and 2012, nearly 40% of all violent crimes were committed by people living at or below the federal poverty level.” Poverty level is determined by the amount of family members in a household and the amount of total income the family brings in annually. Impoverished people will often turn to crime, usually drug trafficking, as a way to make money to pay for their daily expenses. The drug industry is responsible for a significant amount of violence in the United States due to the competitiveness and illegal nature of it. In addition, people who go to prison for their offenses have an almost impossible time getting jobs and turning their life around, so they return to their former life of crime. This essentially makes violence lead to poverty. A possible solution to this would be to get rid of the war on crime, and legalize non-violent drug use. Some people would say that crime is correlated with someone's values rather than their economic situation, but there is a lack of data to support this hypothesis. Violence and poverty go hand in hand, and each perpetuates the other.
Children who come from impoverished families are nearly 7 times more likely to drop out of high school than their average or above average income counterparts. People who don’t have an education have a much harder time making money in conventional ways than those who do. The drug trafficking industry has a lot of money in it and requires no experience or education. Consequently, a lot of uneducated poor people will start selling drugs in order to make ends meet. A higher volume of drug sales results in a higher volume of drug usage. About 70 percent of all reported overdoses in Summit County, Ohio in 2016 happened to people living in below average income neighborhoods. It is important to note that rich and poor people would seek medical care for overdoses at the same rate, which would ultimately lead to it being reported. This statistic is unlikely to be a result of law enforcement bias against poor communities.
Violence and the drug trade are intimately related. Violence is present in nearly all aspects of the drug trade. One of the main reasons for this is the existence of gangs. According to the National Gang Center, 82 percent of violent gang-related crimes in 2012 were influenced by drug related factors. Gangs sell large quantities of drugs, and will turn to violence to get their way in the drug trade. If someone doesn’t pay the gang or stops buying drugs from them, for example, the gang may turn to intimidation or extortion tactics to get as much money as they can. Another reason drugs and gangs cause so much violence is the illegal nature of the two. There are no civil mechanisms by which people can resolve their conflicts in the drug world. Only interpersonal interactions can resolve conflict, which often takes the form of violence.
Poor people are more likely to commit crimes for the reasons previously stated. Many of their crimes are violent ones for which they are eventually caught and imprisoned. When someone is imprisoned, his or her life changes forever. Most importantly, it is extremely difficult for ex-convicts to get another job. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 would ideally prevent this anti-convict discrimination, but it is not fully effective. According to CareerBuilder, 82 percent of employers screen job candidates for criminal history. The choice an employer has to make between an ex-convict and someone with no criminal history is an easy one. If someone is caught committing a crime and is subsequently imprisoned or given a citation, they will be a very unlikely candidate for most jobs. If someone can’t get a job, they are almost guaranteed to be in poverty. For the reasons stated before, an impoverished person is far more likely to commit another crime, and many of their crimes turn out to be violent. This situation creates a cycle by which poverty creates violence and violence creates poverty.
One of the main reasons that drugs lead to violence so often is the War on Drugs. The War on Drugs essentially makes all nonviolent drug use illegal. Since drug use of any sort is illegal, it is impossible to sort problems out in a civil court. As was stated earlier, the only way for problems to be solved in the drug world is through personal interaction, which too often turns violent. For example, if someone didn’t pay full price for drugs, the drug dealer would likely go intimidate or get violent with the buyer in order to get their due payment. If nonviolent drug use were legal, the dealer could report the drug thief to the police, who would then go punish them for their theft. This would prevent the need for violence in the drug trade. The best way to stop the cycle of violence and poverty is to bring attention to the War on Drugs and start educating people on its effects.
On November 18, 2014, the National Review posted an article by Dennis Prager titled Poverty Doesn’t Cause azCrime. In the article, Prager argues that since many poor people possess the basic necessities of life, a lack of those necessities would not explain the correlation between poverty and crime. He then talks about how his poor immigrant grandparents would not have committed any of these crimes. He concludes by arguing that it is the Judeo-Christian values of his grandparents that stopped them from committing crimes. He says that a lack of Judeo-Christian values leads to crime, rather than poverty. There are very few statistics to back his claim, and he did not provide any of them. If by “Judeo-Christian” he was referring to values of hard work, honesty, and charity, there is very little debate about him being correct. However, the goal of his article was to contrast Judeo-Christian values with the values of progressive and politically left Americans. The idea that progressive leftists don’t also believe in hard work and charity is ridiculous and misinformed. Poverty is highly correlated with violence and crime, while religion and value systems are not correlated with violence and crime.
In conclusion, poverty and crime are very related, with each leading to the other. Poor people will often turn to crime to make money, usually drug trafficking, which often leads them to be violent. People get stuck in a cycle of poverty and violence because they have a very hard time getting jobs after they get out of jail if they get caught and convicted for their crimes. The best way to solve this is to educate everyone on the War on Drugs, with the negative effects of that source being talked about. It could eliminate the need for violence for a lot of situations in the drug world. Poverty leads to violence and crime, and someone’s values are not nearly as correlated with violence or crime.
