Treading Carefully. Examining the Data on Racism

Treading carefully here.

I’m a data guy so I wanted to know what the data says about race. Let’s look at hate crimes:

California is the most populous state in the country (and most diverse) and they have very broad hate crimes statues. But look what has happened since 2001:

We’ve seen an uptick in reports over the last few years but we’re talking a few dozen incidents in difference. 241 hate crimes against blacks in 2014 vs. 276 in 2018. And when you break out the type of crimes nearly 30% are property crimes with hate crime statutes triggered.

When you follow these crimes through the system the impact is not what I expected.

In 2018: 1,237 hate crimes reported.
- 838 violent hate crime offenses & 426 property
- 425 went to prosecution
- 314 cases were filed
- 228 continued as hate crimes
- and just 67 convictions

I’m perfectly willing to hear arguments that justice wasn’t served or that convictions are difficult with these statutes but consider that 1.2 million people are arrested in California each year. Based on this data you could not in any way claim there is an epidemic of hatred.

One article last year from the New York Times noted that perceptions on race among Americans in general are closer than people think… the conflict comes with ideology: “ “America isn’t racially divided, it’s divided by racial ideology.” Essentially the conflict is policy-driven.

But the main issue at hand is with law enforcement. Here the data is young but it does point to some serious challenges. While incidents of physical force between police and civilians are rare, blacks are 21% more likely than whites to have a weapon drawn on them. However…