[outis]

> It seems unlikely that the connection between fines and large African American populations—a connection that cannot be explained by poverty—is the result of African Americans across the United States committing more finable offenses.

I'm not sure why that seems unlikely. African Americans commit a disproportionately large amount of violent crimes. It seems reasonable to expect that they also commit a larger amount of misdemeanors and minor infractions. It would be far more surprising if they had a higher propensity to break the law, but only when the violation is serious and the penalty heavy.

[cassieramen]

They give some data to back up that statement.

> Although African Americans and Whites report smoking marijuana at the same rates, African Americans are 3.7 times more likely get arrested for marijuana possession.

> An analysis of the National Survey on Drug Use and Health found that 6.6% of White people between the ages of 12 and 25 have sold drugs compared to 5.0% of Blacks. Yet Black people are 3.6 times more likely get arrested for selling drugs.

[fiatmoney]

Those numbers conflate "ever sold" with "sold in the last N days", and yearly vs. weekly usage rates. For regular usage (which would be expected to track sales, and possession) the numbers are substantially higher for blacks.

http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/11/25/race-and-justice-much-m...

Is a good meta-analysis, which on this particular data point leads to:

http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/rdusda.pdf

And in the OP's substantive point about "violent crimes", the FBI's crime stats prove them definitively correct.

[flukus]

How many of those are arrested in high crime areas? What is the arrest rate like in comparison to poor white areas?

The discrepancy may be explainable simply by the police presence in the area.

[alsetmusic]

> The discrepancy may be explainable simply by the police presence in the area.

I'd take it one step further:

I live in a medium to medium class neighborhood with a few lower priced apartments dotted throughout. One is actually next door to me. I had to call 911 last weekend when a bbq at the apt building next to me was close to violence. I listened through an open window as one calm male tried to disuade his friend from starting a fight as the latter ranted for 45 minutes in the street sometime after midnight. I heard male number one mention an open arrest warrant as an attempt to reason with male number two that violence was not going to end well. Male number two repeatedly dismissed this and periodically became hysterical with anger.

Between my initial call to 911 and the time when police arrived, I heard a new voice arrive, alerting the hostile guy that he (male number three) had called his cousin for backup and reminding everyone that his cousin is a Crip (a west coast gang, for those who are unfamiliar). I made a second 911 call to update the officers that the situation appeared to be escalating.

So, what I'm driving towards is the additional possibility that this type of behavior sticks out terribly in a quiet neighborhood where most residents have families and go to sleep by 10pm. The likelihood of someone notifying authorities is probably greater than in a high crime area because this is an extremely rare occurrence here.

Edit: yes, I live in a predominantly white neighborhood and the bbq attendees were all black, but that seemed less relevant until I remembered that someone is likely to ask.

[internaut]

> heard male number one mention an open arrest warrant as an attempt to reason with male number two that violence was not going to end well. Male number two repeatedly dismissed this

This is exactly what I was talking about in my post above.

The instinct or intuition to notice danger is totally different. Call it paranoia, call it introspection, it doesn't matter, it is there and it is real.

> this type of behavior sticks out terribly in a quiet neighborhood where most residents have families and go to sleep by 10pm. The likelihood of someone notifying authorities is probably greater

This is why the recent migration from MENA to Germany is going to go very wrong. Combining Germans, a people notoriously for being 'societal correct' with young men from MENA is perfectly calibrated to result in violence. There are no two ways about it.

[tamana]

A Chipotle exec just got busted for cocaine possession. Guess what the charge was, and guess what the proposed punishment is. Guess his skin color (or culture, if you prefer).

[vivekd]

There are so many factors that arise in something like that. For example, the Chipotle executive has access to better lawyers whereas a young black man may only have duty counsel. The Chipotle executive can better speak for himself, knows not to answer police questions, can get character references, is likely under first offense. I'm not saying it's okay, but certainly there are so many factors at play here it would be impossible to distill it to just one and name it as the most prominent single factor.

[semi-extrinsic]

Cue Dave Chapelle singing "I plead the fifth! I plead the fifth!"

[fiatmoney]

He was charged with "criminal possession of a controlled substance". Your point?

[flukus]

And most importantly, guess how wealthy they were and ask yourself if a poor person with the same skin color would get the same sentence.

[internaut]

In my experience working with a black coworker (doesn't smoke), he would seemingly ignore signals that he needed to modify his behavior example: once he wanted to go into a shop to browse but the shop owner was closing. He talked his way past her, but I distinctly remember feeling uncomfortable; thinking that was something I would never do in a million years, and I'm not the most socially adroit person either. Other than this boorish behavior he is a perfectly reasonable human being who is well known to be very friendly in the community, but I doubt he'd even recognize the existence of the possibility she could have called the police on him.

If people act like boors, it makes sense they are more likely to get arrested.

Another occasion he installed a wooden shed behind the council house (housing for the poor) he lived in. The council predictably told him they would kick his family out of the house if they didn't take it down. Again; another thing I would never have done in a million years because I would have assumed it was obvious I needed permission before building sheds on a property I do not own. Shit, I probably even need planning permission from the government, let alone the property owner in lots of cases.

I strongly suspect it is the same thing with smoking drugs. Some groups act in ways which are far more likely to get them arrested even if they commit those crimes at comparable rates to the native population example: smoking illegal drugs in the street vs smoking them in your own home.

I don't have an explanation for the underlying mechanism but I've seen the same thing time and time again in (five) black persons I've been working with. They're not bad people or stupid, certainly not the ones I work with, but their 'boundaries' just aren't the same as mine and other white coworkers. What is an immediate and definite red flag for trouble ahead to me is invisible to them, it is like there is a communication band they don't access. Which is weird because the five people I worked with were certainly more socially adaptive than I.

My rough guess is that I and other natives have, let us call it: a residual paranoia instinct that black foreigners do not. I expect different groups have different social relations and this is an invisible wall dividing people that hardly anybody feels comfortable thinking or talking about.

[jsmith0295]

That is, at least to a certain extent, because of the violent crime rate. That's why more police are in their neighborhoods to begin with.

[jonlucc]

And yet, we end up with swarms of minorities in prison for drug use, while many homicides go unsolved.

[jiiknb]

The definition of "selling drugs" needs to be better refined for this question. I'd like to see the percent of "sold drugs for profit" and "sold drugs to strangers".

[gozur88]

Those numbers are based on surveys. It's junk science.

Blacks get arrested for drugs in about the same ratio to whites as they commit violent crime.

[johnpowell]

My sister has twin girls that are 15 and a few years ago they stole some booze from the house. They took the booze and snuck out at 3AM. They went to their schools playground with a bunch of kids from high school. They got fucked up and the cops came. Both of them ran and hid in bushes and were caught.

They were running from the cops and dove into bushes. But pretty white girls that lived in a place where the average house is over a million. No ticket or anything. Cops took them home and woke up their mom and they had their iPhones taken away for a month. That was all.

If they were black males doing the same the situation would have ended very differently.

[gozur88]

If they were men of any color, you mean. Welcome to the real world.

[fsloth]

What are the worse things that could happen to a minor who runs from a cop and hides in the US?

[joecool1029]

K-9 units and helicopters.

from today: http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/fare-beating-t...

[douche]

It could easily be spun into resisting arrest, which is a Class A Misdemeanor in most jurisdictions.

[Teever]

Death?

[bsder]

> African Americans commit a disproportionately large amount of violent crimes. It seems reasonable to expect that they also commit a larger amount of misdemeanors and minor infractions.

There is no obvious causal reason to link violent offenses and non-violent offenses. In fact, in my experience, I would expect an inverse causal relationship. I know quite a few ... people ... who would pick your pocket, steal from your house, etc. but would never actually physically assault somebody.

Your statement might be true, but some data is required.

[fiatmoney]

The relevant data is here.

https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2013/...

[bsder]

And I see no obvious causal link.

In addition, non-violent offenses concerning alcohol are heavily skewed toward a racial component of white yet seem to not related to violent offenses at all.

You're going to have to work a lot harder to show causality.

[deviate_X]

The African-American crime rate is something like 2 time's the population rate.

The article data indicates that the fine rates are as high as 21 times the normal rate.

It does not look like the crime rate is enough to explain the fine rate.