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In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

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Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#111

Post by strenholme »

watwut wrote: post #107
strenholme wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another possibility, discussed at depth in Freakonomics , is that reducing unwanted children reduced crime rates. There is some controversy about this, but it may be one of the factors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legalized_abortion_and_crime_e...

Yeah, but given choice, I will go for scientific explanation and for what sociologists say then for pop book that was not even peer reviewed.

The peer-reviewed science says that legalized abortion accounts for about 20-30% of the crime reduction we have seen. (Reference: The Wikipedia article I already linked to in the grandparent post)

Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#112

Post by syntheticcorp »

ramchip wrote: post #110
ajmurmann wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep hearing that crime in rural areas has been going up and that now even cake wrangling is a problem liked in old wild west movies. Your general point that on a lawyer scale we are safer than ever stands Best source short googling could find: https://www.wsj.com/articles/nothing-but-you-and-the-cows-an...

What's cake wrangling?

Maybe an autocorrect from cow rustling? I can’t find anything online about cake wrangling, exciting as it sounds.

Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#113

Post by asciident »

With the massive unemployment and SBA fraud these days [1,2,3], the "banks" are being robbed every minute just in a quieter way.

[1] https://krebsonsecurity.com/2020/05/u-s-secret-service-massi...

[2] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2020-10-29/small-bus...

[3] https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-12-21/californ...

Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#114

Post by Gibbon1 »

npunt wrote: post #65

Whenever the high crime rates in the 70s-90s is brought up I like to remind folks this was likely an aberration with a specific environmental cause (lead), rather than representative of human nature. This [1] is an eye-opening roundup of ~25 major studies that support the lead-crime hypothesis, including comparisons across countries & cultures. The evidence is pretty overwhelming and certainly changed my perspective…

Now consider the lead politics hypothesis. If lead exposure lead to brain damage that resulted in the murder rate tripling, what is that doing to civic politics? Because while that generation has mostly aged out of the higher crime demographic. It's smack in the middle of the voter demographic.

Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#115

Post by Daho0n »

paulpauper wrote: post #9

When pundits --on either side of the pollical spectrum--talk about how bad America is or how things are on the verge of collapse societally, show them stats such as this. By almost every metric, as bad as things may seem, they were objectively worse decades ago. Yeah, it feels like people are angrier than ever, especially online, but Twitter is not real life. A combination of increased tech surveillance, longer priso…

Ransomware, hacking, etc. should be counted in those numbers to compare. I'll bet that it is way more lucrative and way easier to get a big payout today than when you had to go there with a gun.

Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#116

Post by mixmastamyk »

randmeerkat wrote: post #71
techsupporter wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Homelessness has always been a problem in this country; it just wasn't as visible as it is now. That visibility is from a bunch of reasons (the Internet makes all things more visible, cities became more popular instead of "white flight," sprawl in more areas). All the way back in 1995--jesus, that's 25 years ago, I feel old--Star Trek: Deep Space Nine had a two-part episode on "Sanctuary Districts" and staggering wea…

I can’t find anything on a quick Google that shows differences between 1980 and present. I did find this though: https://endhomelessness.org/homelessness-in-america/homeless... That site states homelessness across the country is down 12% from 2007 - 2019, but it is up 9% in California in the same time period. I think this validates asking the question of whether or not tech has been detrimental to general human welfa…

Mentally ill thrown out on the streets, and scarcity of housing are the major factors.

Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#117

Post by throwaway_dcnt »

EGreg wrote: post #61
manfredo wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Usually at auction. Even poor quality, worn out registered automatics will run in the high thousands, or low tens of thousands because of constrained supply. This creates interesting dynamics where people take cheap (relatively, still ~$5,000 on the low end) legal automatics like MAC-10s and converting them to 5.56x45mm while retaining the original lower receiver. Example: https://youtu.be/YjrnB2cXSqM

Wait wat? These are legal somehow in USA? Can you please trace how and prove it with links?

Yes, I own a few in fact. Although I don't live in CA. It was quite an arduous journey too, the paperwork was lost twice, once by the local sheriff (who has to sign an affidavit saying he or she vouches for you) and subsequently by ATF who approve the paperwork and send you a tax stamp as proof of this approval. Interesting Americana for an immigrant like myself and I had to get these machine guns just because it is such an American thing to do.

Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#118

Post by Daniel_sk »

DennisP wrote: post #24
conception wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just a point of clarification for those not familiar with the heist, the weapons used were -not- legal in CA or the US. It was also during the time of the Federal Assault Weapons ban. They were not owned nor able to be owned legally during that time. It was also the inspiration for Heat’s shootout!

So to clarify that...the federal Assault Weapons Ban applied to semi-auto rifles with certain ergonomic features, including pistol grips, flash hiders, and folding stocks. (Semi-auto is one bullet per trigger pull, full-auto means you can hold the trigger down and spray bullets.) The North Hollywood robbers had illegally modified their weapons to enable full-auto fire. Since well before 1997, modifying guns like this…

From wikipedia: An inventory of the weapons used:[7]

    A Bushmaster XM-15 converted illegally to fire full auto with two 100-round Beta Magazines
    A Heckler & Koch HK-91 semi automatic rifle with several 30-round magazines[38]
    A Beretta 92FS Inox with several magazines
    Three different civilian-model AK-47 style rifles converted illegally to fire full auto with several 75- to 100-round drum magazines, as well as 30-round box magazines.

Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#119

Post by freeflight »

nerbert wrote: post #12
paulpauper wrote: post #10

The 80s were a crime paradise.--drug gangs, mafia, wall st white collar crime, informercial scams, televangelist and cult scams --you name it, it all thrived in the 80s.

Then came the police state and the party was over.

It's debatable if the police state was actually responsible for that drop in crime.

Afaik Canada saw a comparable drop in crime, over the same time-period, without starting to mass incarcerate people [0]

[0] https://youtu.be/wtV5ev6813I (Relevant stats and discussion start around 6:45, but the whole talk is rather worthwhile to watch)

Re: In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)

#120

Post by oblio »

Melting_Harps wrote: post #98
konjin wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>And while I personally have no desire to live in CA anytime soon, except the occasional visit, I'm glad so many decided to leave since COVID. In a decade or two it may look like and feel as it did when I was a kid in the 90s and I may be tempted to go back. A bank robbery every hour? And I thought my nostalgia for the leaded gasoline and burning asbestos tram breaks smells was odd.

> A bank robbery every hour? More like a reminder that primitive tendencies can revert Society back to its violent mean really quickly and that in turn instilled a need to want to preserve what we have and build resilient communities to that end as we all felt vulnerable to that ever-present danger. The fact that no one speaks to their neighbors now is a stark contrast to my childhood in the late 80s and 90s where ev…

> More like a reminder that primitive tendencies can revert Society back to its violent mean really quickly and that in turn instilled a need to want to preserve what we have and build resilient communities to that end as we all felt vulnerable to that ever-present danger.

Or, you know, not live in perpetual fear of society breaking down, which is something afforded to us by thousands of years of progress and innumerable sacrifices.

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