The general media has certainly left us with a narrative that police are at horribly increased risk; that it's much more dangerous to be a cop now than ever before.
In the vein of "things usually are getting better", I've compiled the number of police deaths over time, as well as adjusted for population. The charts show what I expected: Not only are police deaths steadily decreasing on an absolute scale, they're at their lowest rates ever when scaled for population. I've charted numbers over trailing 5 year windows to smooth out the some inevitable amount of year-to-year volatility.
Looking at the trends shows two eras of particularly bad casualty rates: prohibition (1920 to 1933) and the rise of cocaine/crack (late 70s and early 80s). Both of these eras came with, essentially, wars on the streets. And, of course, the 50s and 60s were just swell! The current rate is roughly 2/3 of the more recent peak.
Of course, comparing absolute numbers over the course of history does not account for the rising population. If things were the same, we'd expect the rate to scale with population. The second trendline shows office deaths per year, per 100million population (again over a trailing 5-year window). This chart shows a similar trend, but even more so. Prohibition and crack still jump out, but now prohibition looks twice as bad. And, the current rate is the lowest, ever, with rates falling to around 1/3 of the more recent spike.
While being a cop clearly has serious risks, there's never been a safer time to be one.
In the vein of "things usually are getting better", I've compiled the number of police deaths over time, as well as adjusted for population. The charts show what I expected: Not only are police deaths steadily decreasing on an absolute scale, they're at their lowest rates ever when scaled for population. I've charted numbers over trailing 5 year windows to smooth out the some inevitable amount of year-to-year volatility.
Looking at the trends shows two eras of particularly bad casualty rates: prohibition (1920 to 1933) and the rise of cocaine/crack (late 70s and early 80s). Both of these eras came with, essentially, wars on the streets. And, of course, the 50s and 60s were just swell! The current rate is roughly 2/3 of the more recent peak.
Of course, comparing absolute numbers over the course of history does not account for the rising population. If things were the same, we'd expect the rate to scale with population. The second trendline shows office deaths per year, per 100million population (again over a trailing 5-year window). This chart shows a similar trend, but even more so. Prohibition and crack still jump out, but now prohibition looks twice as bad. And, the current rate is the lowest, ever, with rates falling to around 1/3 of the more recent spike.
While being a cop clearly has serious risks, there's never been a safer time to be one.
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