Deadly crime in Denver near a record low
Why it matters: The city's sharp descent mirrors a nationwide shift away from COVID-era crime spikes, with major cities like Los Angeles and New York reporting some of the steepest homicide declines on record — challenging the narrative that urban crime is spiraling.
By the numbers: As of July 13, Denver's homicide rate was 2.7 per 100,000 people — the city's second-lowest midyear figure since 2004, per Denver Police Department data analyzed by Axios.
State of play: Denver police Chief Ron Thomas tells Axios that a multi-pronged strategy is working:
👮♀️ Better staffing: DPD has largely overcome an officer shortage — now at 95% capacity (with about 1,550 officers) — enabling quicker response times and increased visibility.
🧠 Smart enforcement: Patrols in crime hotspots like Lower Downtown and East Colfax are paired with infrastructure fixes, like better lighting, to deter violence.
✅ High clearance rate: With an 83% solve rate for homicides, better evidence-gathering tools and stronger community trust — which has led to more tips and information-sharing — are getting results.
⛑️ Street medicine: Police have improved on-scene trauma care, like tourniquets and chest seals, to save lives before paramedics arrive.
🤝 Community partnerships: Organizations like Struggle of Love are stepping in before violence escalates — mediating conflicts and keeping at-risk youth engaged.
🗣️ Advocacy: Groups like East Students Demand Action have helped push for tougher gun laws at the state level.
Yes, but: Not all of Denver's trends are encouraging. Youth violence remains stubbornly high, Thomas notes, and crime persists in nightlife corridors.
Between the lines: One of the hardest things to change is public perception. Despite the drop in violent crime, Thomas says fear remains high.
"We are working with the mayor's office to get to the root of those things that impact people's perceptions," Thomas says. That includes reducing open drug use, unsheltered homelessness and retail theft.
What they're saying: "These numbers represent significant accomplishments by our police department, sheriff's office, and outreach teams in protecting the innocent and making Denver what we know it can be: the safest city in the country," Mayor Mike Johnston told Axios Denver in a statement.
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Fast Company
20 minutes ago
- Fast Company
3 things the pronatalist movement gets wrong about birth rates
Pronatalism—the belief that low birth rates are a problem that must be reversed— is having a moment in the U.S. As birth rates decline in the U.S. and throughout the world, voices from Silicon Valley to the White House are raising concerns about what they say could be the calamitous effects of steep population decline on the economy. The Trump administration has said it is seeking ideas on how to encourage Americans to have more children as the U.S. experiences its lowest total fertility rate in history, down about 25% since 2007. As demographers who study fertility, family behaviors, and childbearing intentions, we can say with certainty that population decline is not imminent, inevitable or necessarily catastrophic. The population collapse narrative hinges on three key misunderstandings. First, it misrepresents what standard fertility measures tell us about childbearing and makes unrealistic assumptions that fertility rates will follow predictable patterns far into the future. Second, it overstates the impact of low birth rates on future population growth and size. Third, it ignores the role of economic policies and labor market shifts in assessing the impacts of low birth rates. Fertility fluctuations Demographers generally gauge births in a population with a measure called the total fertility rate. The total fertility rate for a given year is an estimate of the average number of children that women would have in their lifetime if they experienced current birth rates throughout their childbearing years. Fertility rates are not fixed—in fact, they have changed considerably over the past century. In the U.S., the total fertility rate rose from about 2 births per woman in the 1930s to a high of 3.7 births per woman around 1960. The rate then dipped below 2 births per woman in the late 1970s and 1980s before returning to 2 births in the 1990s and early 2000s. Since the Great Recession that lasted from late 2007 until mid-2009, the U.S. total fertility rate has declined almost every year, with the exception of very small post-COVID-19 pandemic increases in 2021 and 2022. In 2024, it hit a record low, falling to 1.6. This drop is primarily driven by declines in births to people in their teens and early 20s —births that are often unintended. But while the total fertility rate offers a snapshot of the fertility landscape, it is not a perfect indicator of how many children a woman will eventually have if fertility patterns are in flux—for example, if people are delaying having children. Picture a 20-year-old woman today, in 2025. The total fertility rate assumes she will have the same birth rate as today's 40-year-olds when she reaches 40. 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In other words, it doesn't seem to be the case that birth rates are low because people are uninterested in having children; rather, it's because they don't feel it's feasible for them to become parents or to have as many children as they would like. The challenge of predicting future population size Standard demographic projections do not support the idea that population size is set to shrink dramatically. One billion people lived on Earth 250 years ago. Today there are over 8 billion, and by 2100 the United Nations predicts there will be over 10 billion. That's 2 billion more, not fewer, people in the foreseeable future. Admittedly, that projection is plus or minus 4 billion. But this range highlights another key point: Population projections get more uncertain the further into the future they extend. Predicting the population level five years from now is far more reliable than 50 years from now—and beyond 100 years, forget about it. 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