I blogged just a few minutes ago about a purported causal link between sports and crime. Now comes word that according to the latest F.B.I. statistics, the most dangerous city in America is St. Louis, and No. 2 is Detroit. Those cities are, of course, home to the recent World Series-winning Cardinals and the runner-up Tigers. So is a high crime rate the key to having a great baseball season? If so, maybe that’s why the Yankees haven’t won a Series in seven years: New York City crime has fallen below an acceptable level. This crime/baseball correlation reminds me of an example we used in Freakonomics:
The “Moratorium” argument — [which stated that a moratorium on prison construction would decrease crime rates] — rests on a fundamental confusion of correlation and causality. Consider a parallel argument. The mayor of a city sees that his citizens celebrate wildly when their team wins the World Series. He is intrigued by this correlation but, like the “Moratorium” author, fails to see the direction in which the correlation runs. So the following year, the mayor decrees that his citizens start celebrating the World Series before the first pitch is thrown — an act that, in his confused mind, will ensure a victory.
So just to be clear: it is highly unlikely that a city can increase its baseball odds by increasing crime. But at least the bad crime news in St. Louis and Detroit is perhaps leavened a bit by their recent baseball success.
7 Comments
I think you are mixing two different kind of arguments here. In your statement:
“The “Moratorium” argument —[which stated that a moratorium on prison construction would decrease crime rates]—rests on a fundamental confusion of correlation and causality. Consider a parallel argument. The mayor of a city sees that his citizens celebrate wildly when their team wins the World Series. He is intrigued by this correlation but, like the “Moratorium” author, fails to see the direction in which the correlation runs. So the following year, the mayor decrees that his citizens start celebrating the World Series before the first pitch is thrown — an act that, in his confused mind, will ensure a victory.”
There actually is causation, the mayor just has it in reverse.
In your comment:
“I blogged just a few minutes ago about a purported causal link between sports and crime. Now comes word that according to the latest F.B.I. statistics, the most dangerous city in America is St. Louis, and No. 2 is Detroit. Those cities are, of course, home to the recent World Series-winning Cardinals and the runner-up Tigers. So is a high crime rate the key to having a great baseball season? If so, maybe that’s why the Yankees haven’t won a Series in seven years: New York City crime has fallen below an acceptable level.”
You appear to be suggesting that there is no causation at all, not a reversal in the direction of the causation, i.e.you are not implying the reverse that winning the World Series results in a high crime city.
Your example doesn’t fit your argument.
— Raymond KellerIf only this were true, then there would be some predictive potential of this theory.
But alas, my Kansas City is ranked #16 most dangerous, and we all know how the Royals’ season went……
— davinicAlso, the methodology used for this is city boundaries. I think that that MSA metro area is a better indicator of overall crime for an area. If you take cities like St. Louis and Kansas City, where the population moved out from the city cores to various suburbs with their own cities, the numbers are rather different — execept for Detroit, where the entire MSA is hit with the crime rate.
— davinicMaybe the causation is that a high crime rate makes the players of a team more motivated to perform well so they can get a trade with a better team in another city…
Maybe the longer a team has not won the world series the worst the crime rate?
There’s some cosmic forces at work…
— ActeonBut why do you think there is the crime/sports relationship? Is it possibly because criminals might tend to be fitter, therefore better at sports? Or could the crime levels intimidate or anger the players, causing them to do well?
— andrewbaigeySt. Louis always shows up high in these kinds of lists, when only the city proper is considered.
Relative to other major cities, the city limits of St. Louis contain much less population, and the population they DO contain is, I think poorer and presumably more crime ridden.
St. Louis city has about 390K residents, I think, out of ~2.4 million in the MSA. So only about 16% of St. Louisans live in the city proper. In other major cities, I believe the numbers are much higher, 40-50% or so in many cases.
— psteinxWhat about the whole correlation between a winning team and the seemingly resultant street fights/violence among the team’s home (inner-) city youth? I’m thinking back to when the Raiders/49ers were both highly winning teams and jackets with their logos were being killed for.
As a side note, hadn’t basketball shoes, those made by the company that certain pro-athletes had worn, also seemingly sparked such cases of violence in major cities? Or is my memory simply failing?
— Veda