Chart assignment

Charts to read and discuss

Read each chart, then answer its questions. Every chart shows its source and date; open it for a table of the numbers and the data to download.

  1. Which big U.S. cities' murder rates fell most in the last year?
  2. Are U.S. roads getting safer per mile driven?

Chart 1 of 2 · Crime

Which big U.S. cities' murder rates fell most in the last year?

The interactive chart needs JavaScript. The numbers are on the chart's page.

Of the 79 big U.S. cities (250,000 people or more) whose police reported every month of 2025 and the year before to the FBI, the murder rate fell most in Irving, TX (-80.1%), Tampa, FL (-51.5%) and Glendale, AZ (-51%) in 2025, and rose most in El Paso, TX (29.3%) and Omaha, NE (27.8%). Across the U.S. it fell 16.5%. A city with few murders can swing a lot in a year, so cities with fewer than 10 murders in the earlier year are left out, as are departments that missed a month (for 2024 and 2025, New Orleans, Orlando and St. Petersburg, Florida). Each rate is per person the department serves.

Questions to discuss

  1. In one sentence of your own, what does this chart show?
  2. Find the biggest change or difference in the chart. What might explain it?
  3. Who collected these numbers, and how recent are they? What else would you want to know before drawing a conclusion?

Source: FBI Crime Data Explorer, Uniform Crime Reporting Program (Public domain (U.S. government work); source FBI Uniform Crime Reporting Program) · Data as of Dec 31, 2025

Open the chart and its numbers

Chart 2 of 2 · Road safety

Are U.S. roads getting safer per mile driven?

The interactive chart needs JavaScript. The numbers are on the chart's page.

In 2024 there were 1.19 deaths for every 100 million miles driven, down from 3.35 in 1980. The lowest rate was 1.08 in 2014; it jumped to 1.34 in 2020, when people drove less but deaths rose. Miles driven are the Federal Highway Administration's estimates.

How to read this chart

Each point is the number of people killed in traffic crashes for every 100 million miles Americans drove that year. Dividing by miles driven turns a count into a rate, so years when people drove more or less can be compared fairly.

Questions to discuss

  1. About what fraction of the 1980 rate is the rate in the latest year?
  2. In 2020 people drove less, but the rate went up. What could explain that?
  3. Why is deaths per mile a fairer way to compare years than the total number of deaths?

Source: NHTSA Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) and FHWA Highway Statistics (table VM-2) (Public domain (U.S. government work)) · Data as of Dec 31, 2024

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