Between 2019 and 2021, homicide rates in American cities surged by approximately 30% — the largest two-year increase in recorded American history. This was not a gradual trend. It was a sudden, severe spike that killed thousands of additional Americans and reversed two decades of crime reduction.
Understanding what happened, who was affected, and what the data shows now requires cutting through both the political dismissiveness that denies rising crime and the political sensationalism that exaggerates it. The reality is more specific and more complex than either narrative.
What the Data Shows
Homicides in 2020: The FBI Uniform Crime Report and CDC mortality data both recorded an approximately 29–30% increase in homicides from 2019 to 2020. This was the largest single-year increase in U.S. history.
2021: Homicides increased again, by approximately 5%, before beginning to decline.
2022–2023: Homicides declined modestly — approximately 10–13% below the 2021 peak in most cities, according to preliminary FBI data and city-level reporting.
Context: Even after the recent declines, homicide rates in many American cities remain significantly above their pre-2020 levels. The surge was large enough that the progress of modest declines has not returned cities to where they were in 2019, let alone the lows of 2014.
Key numbers:
- 2020 homicides (estimated): Approximately 21,500, up from approximately 16,400 in 2019
- Cities most affected: Chicago, Philadelphia, New York, Los Angeles, Houston, Columbus
- Demographic concentration: The overwhelming majority of victims and perpetrators in homicides are Black men
Who Bore the Cost
Any honest analysis of the 2020–2022 homicide surge must begin with who died. The homicide surge was not evenly distributed across the American population.
Black Americans
Approximately 55–60% of homicide victims in the United States are Black Americans, who represent roughly 13% of the population. The additional homicides of the 2020 spike fell disproportionately on Black men in urban areas. The CDC’s excess mortality analysis estimated that in 2020, the homicide death rate for Black Americans increased by roughly 35%, compared to a 24% increase for White Americans.
The victims of the 2020 homicide surge were overwhelmingly Black Americans in cities that were already struggling with concentrated poverty, limited economic opportunity, and under-resourced communities.
Young Men
As in previous eras, the overwhelming majority of homicide victims and perpetrators are young men. The age group 18–34 accounts for the majority of both. The spike in homicides was concentrated in intra-community violence among this demographic.
What Caused the Surge?
This is genuinely contested among researchers, and honesty requires acknowledging the uncertainty. Several factors were almost certainly involved.
The Pandemic Effect
2020 was simultaneously a period of dramatic social disruption: COVID-19 lockdowns, school closures, economic shocks, and massive disruptions to normal social routines. Research on crime consistently shows that disruptions to social routines and informal social controls correlate with crime increases.
The closure of schools, community centers, churches, and social programs removed the institutional scaffolding that helps channel youth behavior. Social isolation, economic stress, and reduced mobility may have increased interpersonal tensions within households and communities.
The Police Withdrawal Effect
Following the murder of George Floyd in May 2020 and the nationwide protests and policy debates that followed, police departments in many cities pulled back from proactive policing. “De-policing” — officers becoming less proactive out of fear of career consequences or in response to community pressure — is documented in multiple studies.
Criminologist Richard Rosenfeld’s research found that the cities with the largest increases in homicides in 2020 were those that had experienced the most intense policing reform pressure and the sharpest reductions in police-community contacts.
The Gun Availability Factor
2020 also saw an unprecedented surge in firearm purchases — approximately 23 million guns sold in 2020, the highest single-year total ever recorded. The increased availability of firearms in communities already experiencing social stress may have contributed to the deadliness of conflicts that in previous years would have produced injuries rather than deaths.
Property Crime: A Different Picture
While homicide surged in 2020–2021, property crime — burglary, auto theft, larceny — was declining nationally during this period. This creates a paradox that media coverage frequently obscures.
“Crime” is not one thing. Violent crime and property crime can move in different directions at the same time, for different reasons. An accurate assessment of public safety requires distinguishing between crime types rather than treating all crime as one phenomenon.
The 2023–2024 Picture
Preliminary data from 2023 and 2024 suggests homicide rates have continued to decline from the 2021 peak. Major cities including New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia all reported lower homicide totals in 2023 compared to 2022.
Whether this represents a return to the pre-2020 long-term downward trend, or a statistical regression to the mean following an anomalous two-year spike, remains to be seen. The structural conditions that drove the surge — concentrated poverty, gun proliferation, de-policing in some cities — have not been fundamentally altered.
Sources
- FBI, “Crime in the United States,” Uniform Crime Reports, 2020–2023
- CDC, “National Center for Health Statistics: Homicide Data,” 2020–2022
- Richard Rosenfeld, “Pandemic, Social Unrest, and Crime in U.S. Cities,” CJRC, 2020
- Patrick Sharkey, Uneasy Peace: The Great Crime Decline, the Renewal of City Life, and the Next Battle Over Broken Windows, 2018
- Brennan Center for Justice, “Crime in 2022: Updated Analysis,” 2023
- Major Cities Chiefs Association, “Violent Crime Survey,” 2023