Seeing What's Not There

As the song goes, a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest. Same goes for sight. Eyes can deceive, especially when the owner wants them to.

Crime is an excellent case in point. Three out of every four Americans believe crime is getting worse when in fact it has been declining sharply. Violent crime is down in every region of the country, in communities of all sizes, with the biggest decreases coming in the nation’s largest cities. There is widespread belief that major metropolitan areas are crime infested and visiting one puts your life in danger, despite the reality that murder rates are dropping precipitously in big cities from coast to coast.

Every kind of crime has been falling in the U.S. except vehicle theft, reflected in sizeable percentage decreases according to FBI data over the last year.