New York City Murder Rate by Year

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Last updated: Monday June 28th, 2021

New York City's murder rate skyrocketed in the late 1960s, stayed high for two decades, but plummeted in the 1990s. Today, New York City is one of the safer large cities in the United States.

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Year	Murder Rate
1928	6.1
1929	6.3
1930	7.1
1931	8.4
1932	8.2
1933	7.6
1934	6.4
1936	7
1939	3.9
1940	3.7
1941	3.6
1942	3.5
1943	2.6
1944	3.8
1945	3.8
1946	4.5
1947	4.3
1948	4
1949	3.8
1950	3.7
1951	3.1
1952	3.9
1953	4.5
1954	4.4
1955	3.9
1956	4
1957	4
1958	4.5
1959	5
1960	6.2
1961	6.2
1962	8.1
1963	7
1964	8.1
1965	8.1
1966	8.3
1967	9.5
1968	12.5
1969	13.2
1970	14.1
1971	18.8
1972	21.9
1973	22
1974	20.5
1975	22
1976	21.9
1977	21.3
1978	20.8
1979	24.2
1980	25.7
1981	25.7
1982	23.4
1983	22.7
1984	20.2
1985	19.2
1986	21.9
1987	23.1
1988	26.1
1989	26.1
1990	30.7
1991	29.1
1992	26.7
1993	25.8
1994	20.5
1995	15.4
1996	12.7
1997	9.9
1998	8
1999	8.5
2000	8.4
2001	8.1
2002	7.3
2003	7.4
2004	7.1
2005	6.7
2006	7.5
2007	6.2
2008	6.5
2009	5.8
2010	6.5
2011	6.2
2012	5
2013	4
2014	3.9
2015	4.2
2016	4
2017	3.5
2018	3.4
2019	3.7
2020	5.6

9 Comments

+11

Level 71

Jul 5, 2018

I've heard a lot about how much Giuliani did to reduce crime in the 90s, but I never realized just how much the murder rate dropped from 1990 to 2000.

Level 82

Jul 12, 2018

The book Freakonomic actually touches on this topic of the unexpected drop in New York crime during this period. Quite an interesting read, but caused abit of controversy

Level 80

Jul 12, 2018

Internet porn

Level ∞

Jun 28, 2021

https://www.jetpunk.com/users/quizmaster/blog/possible-explanation-for-the-decline-in-murders

Level 81

Jul 13, 2018

Giuliani took credit for a trend that was evident already when he took office.

Level 71

Nov 13, 2019

Yeah, I came to realize that after doing some more research on the topic. The reason for the drop in crime rate is widely debated but it definitely began in the early 90s before Giuliani took office.

Level 54

Apr 10, 2021

If only we could have that Giuliani back...

Level 46

May 14, 2021

Pretty sure by 2020 this figure was way high

Level 28

Oct 24, 2024

It was disturbingly high in the 90s