[kQq9oHeAz6wLLS]

This is a completely useless article. Is 100 a lot? The article never even hints at what percentage of firefighters that is, let alone total arsonists. Should we be outraged? Are firefighters more likely to be arsonists?

It says "in North America", so I assume that's across US and Canada. There are 1.2 million firefighters in the US, and about 150k in Canada, so let's call it 1.3 million. 100 out of 1.3 million is statistically irrelevant.

How's that stack up against the general public? That'd be good to know, but the article doesn't touch on it. The latest data i can find is for the US in 2024, where there were 65,795 arson convictions. There are 349 million people in the US, so the number of arsonists is 0.0001% of the general population. The number of firefighters that are arsonists (100/65,795) is 0.0015%, so I suppose it's slightly higher that the general population.

All this should have been in the article.

[lukasgelbmann]

> There are 349 million people in the US, so the number of arsonists is 0.0001% of the general population. The number of firefighters that are arsonists (100/65,795) is 0.0015%, so I suppose it's slightly higher that the general population.

You comparing arsonists/pop with firefighter-arsonists/arsonists. That’s the wrong comparison. You should be comparing arsonists/pop with firefighter-arsonists/firefighters. Or firefighters/pop with firefighter-arsonists/arsonists.

(On top of that, mixing numbers from different sources can be problematic. For example, how are repeat convictions treated in the different sources? Who counts as a firefighter?)

[user-]

This 'article' (its a blog post if anything) is based on this this CBC article.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/fires-set-by-firefig...

The article refers to a report that 404s.

Both the OPs post and the CBC article say records aren't detailed for this so unless theres some studies (lol funding in current political era) you prob will never have real percents.

But i think its fair to say yea firefighters are more likely to be arsonists i guess.

[defrost]

Matt Hinds-Aldrich NVFC papers:

Firesetting Firefighters: Reconsidering a Persistent Problem--Firefighter Arson Research

~ https://www.academia.edu/1052901/Firesetting_Firefighters_Re...

National Volunteer Fire Council - Report on the Firefighter Arson Problem: Contexts, Considerations, and Best Practices

~ https://www.academia.edu/1052842/National_Volunteer_Fire_Cou...

Firefighter Arson Prevention & Recovery Toolkit - NVFC

~ https://www.academia.edu/3258256/Firefighter_Arson_Preventio...

[jrflowers]

> the number of arsonists is 0.0001% of the general population. The number of firefighters that are arsonists (100/65,795) is 0.0015%, so I suppose it's slightly higher that the general population.

Trying to imagine being really into math and seeing one number that’s fifteen times bigger than another number and posting “that’s slightly higher”