Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
While I'm very happy to be living in San Diego, the question is, what is different about San Diego that makes its violent crime rate so much lower? Or more broadly why are the big California cities in general so much lower in violent crime? Compare the three California cities to the three Texas cities, for example.
Size of police force? No, San Diego and San Jose have relatively small police forces. LA about average.
Gun ownership? No. gun ownership likely higher in Texas.
Economic strength? Texas has been growing faster recently.
I would say a very strong middle class, and the Military presence being dispersed all throughout the city. The city tends to also have a smaller lower, and upper class.
Location: northern Vermont - previously NM, WA, & MA
10,749 posts, read 23,819,647 times
Reputation: 14665
If I had to describe SD in a single word it would be "nice". It has a grounded live and let live feel to it, doesn't swing too far to the left, nor to the right either. One interesting correlation is both San Diego and El Paso are border towns. Though they don't share a lot of other things in common, they are both among two of the safest cities in the US.
As someone who used to live in San Diego, it probably has to do with the cost of living there. When studio apartments cost like $1,600 a month and average houses cost $600,000 you're not going to be having a lot of dirt poor people living there. With more wealth and affluence, you're going to have less crime.
As someone who used to live in San Diego, it probably has to do with the cost of living there. When studio apartments cost like $1,600 a month and average houses cost $600,000 you're not going to be having a lot of dirt poor people living there. With more wealth and affluence, you're going to have less crime.
While most cities have their affluent areas and their ghetto areas, for San Diego pretty much the entire city is upscale and even their worst areas that are considered ghetto by their standards are better off than even some middle class neighborhoods in other cities. Also even though it's politically incorrect to say this, you can't turn away from the fact that demographics plays a huge factor in it as well.
I remember when I was younger I used to hate living in San Diego because I felt like it had an uppity/yuppie vibe to it, and this was 20 years ago so it's become even more expensive and upscale since then. Now that I'm older and a family man with a teenage daughter, my priorities have changed and it would be nice to live in a low crime area.
Last edited by SEAandATL; 09-30-2018 at 07:18 AM..
Reason: More to add
Location: Miami (prev. NY, Atlanta, SF, OC and San Diego)
7,409 posts, read 6,550,878 times
Reputation: 6685
I lived there 13 years and would agree that the bad areas are not as bad as other cities (there really is no Compton or Bedford Stuyvesant in SD) and that definitely helps with lower levels of crime but saying the entire city is upscale is quite the stretch—Clairemont, Bay Park, North Park, Kearney Mesa, Barrio Logan, good stretches of East County, good portions of Chula Vista, Normal Heights, City Heights, Imperial Beach, National City, Vista, Oceanside, etc etc are not what I would call upscale by any means; middle class/lower middle class, OK—upscale (like Coronado, LJ, Rancho Santa Fe, Del Mar, Carlsbad, Poway, Carmel Valley) not. Nevertheless, these other areas are still safer than most and I’m not sure there are too many areas where I would fear for my life at 2AM.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SEAandATL
While most cities have their affluent areas and their ghetto areas, for San Diego pretty much the entire city is upscale and even their worst areas that are considered ghetto by their standards are better off than even some middle class neighborhoods in other cities. Also even though it's politically incorrect to say this, you can't turn away from the fact that demographics plays a huge factor in it as well.
I remember when I was younger I used to hate living in San Diego because I felt like it had an uppity/yuppie vibe to it, and this was 20 years ago so it's become even more expensive and upscale since then. Now that I'm older and a family man with a teenage daughter, my priorities have changed and it would be nice to live in a low crime area.
Last edited by elchevere; 09-30-2018 at 09:06 AM..
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
