(NewsNation) — Violent crime rose in urban, rural and suburban areas across the U.S. in 2022, according to the nation’s largest crime survey released this month.
As has historically been the case, violent crime was highest in urban areas last year, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) found. The violent victimization rate rose 36% in those areas from 2021 to 2022, from 24.5 to 33.4 victimizations per 1,000 persons aged 12 and older.
Violent crime went up by a similar proportion in rural areas last year but remains much lower overall, increasing from 11.1 to 15.4 victimizations per 1,000 persons aged 12 and older. In suburban areas, the rate jumped from 16.5 to 23.9.
Those victimization rates reflect data on nonfatal violent crimes, including rape or sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault and simple assault.
In 2022, there were 6.6 million violent victimizations of people 12 or older in the United States, up from 4.6 million the year prior, according to the survey. That total is similar to the number of violent crime victims in 2018.
From 2021 to 2022, the overall violent victimization rate in the U.S. went from 16.5 to 23.5 per 1,000 persons. That’s a reversal of a decades-long downward trend but still significantly lower than the victimization rate of 79.8 in 1993.
The survey also includes statistics on property crimes like robbery, trespassing and motor vehicle theft. Those crimes also increased across all three geographic areas compared to the year prior.
In 2022, the survey found that the property crime rate in urban areas was nearly twice as high as in suburban areas and three times higher than in rural areas.
Overall, there were 13.4 million property victimizations of U.S. households last year, up from 11.7 million in 2021.
The findings come as Republican politicians argue that the uptick in crime, particularly in urban areas, is due to Democratic policies. Just this week, members of the GOP-controlled House Judiciary Committee hosted a violent crime forum in Chicago where they blasted the “radical left’s agenda.”
Democrats have rejected the GOP’s framing, calling it exploitative of victims and pointing out that homicides are trending down in many major cities.
The NCVS has been ongoing since 1973 and includes data from a nationally representative sample of about 240,000 people across 150,000 households.
Because the survey is based on interviews with victims, homicide is excluded, but the format has other advantages. It allows researchers to gain insights about crimes never reported to police.
Last year, for example, just 42% of violent victimizations were reported to police, according to the NCVS.
The self-report survey is administered each year from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31. Annual victimization estimates are based on crimes that respondents experienced during the prior six months, so the 2022 survey covers crimes that occurred from July 1, 2021, to Nov. 30, 2022.
