the ratio of a crime rate is a ratio, but we can mathematically represent that ratio as a percentage. if there are 3 crimes per 1,000 people, it can be represented as .3%. in my example (and, all these numbers are being made up, although i can look up the actual ones when i get home), a crime rate of 3.5% is equal to 3.5 crimes per 100 people. with 3,000,000 people, the number of crimes would equal 10,500. alternatively, 4% is 4 per 100, and with 2,500,000 people, number of crimes would equal 10,000.
in this way, even though the crime rate (represented here as a percentage) has decreased from 4% to 3.5%, the population size has grown by 500,000, leading to an overall increase in numbers of crimes from 10,000 to 10,500.
__________________
Food for thought.
|