Economy

St. Louis, Missouri, Is the Most Dangerous City in America

Evan Comen

Published: October 1, 2016 9:30 am

Last Updated: January 13, 2020 2:54 am

24/7 Wall St. has released its annual analysis of The Most Dangerous Cities in America. St. Louis, Missouri was at the top of the list.

According to the report:

The FBI reported Monday that 1,197,704 violent crimes were committed in 2015, up 3.9% from 2014. Violent crime rates are by no means uniform across the country. Some of the nation’s cities are far more dangerous than others.

24/7 Wall St. reviewed violent crime rates in major U.S. cities from the FBI’s 2015 Uniform Crime Report. Violent crime includes all offenses involving force or threat of force and are broken into four categories: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault. For every 100,000 U.S. residents, 372 of these crimes were committed in 2015.

Regarding St. Louis specifically:

> Violent crimes per 100,000: 1,817.1
> 2015 murders: 188
> Poverty rate: 27.8%
> Unemployment rate: 6.1%

Including 188 homicides, there were 5,762 violent crimes in St. Louis in 2015. Adjusting for population, the city’s murder and violent crime rates, at 59 murders and 1,817 per 100,000 city residents, are each the highest in the country. The number of violent crimes reported in St. Louis increased by 7.7% last year, faster than the national uptick of 3.9%. Over the last five years, however, the incidence of violent crime is down by 3.2%.

The methodology:

To identify the 25 most dangerous U.S. cities, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed violent crime rates in cities with at least 100,000 people from the FBI’s 2015 Uniform Crime Report released Monday. The total number and rates of murder, non negligent manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault, which are included in the violent crime rate, as well as burglaries, larceny, motor vehicle theft, and arson — all classified as property crime — also came from the FBI’s report. We also considered these data for each year from 2011 through 2015. Annual unemployment rates for 2015 came from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Median household income, poverty rates, the percentage of adults with at least a bachelor’s degree, population, and the percentage of adults with at least a high school diploma came from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS).

Click here to see all of the most dangerous cities in America.