My little home state of Delaware is number 6 on the list of the ten most violent states as per FBI crime statistics published by 24/7. Surprisingly, Tennessee topped the list as the state with the most violent crime per 100,000 people.
A bubble chart of the data for these states, with violent crime in the x-axis, property crimes in the y-axis, and bubble radius proportional to poverty rates shows that there does not appear to be a correlation between violent crime and poverty rates, but there does seem to be a correlation between property crimes and poverty rates in these states. In general, the states with the higher poverty rates (larger bubbles) tend to have higher property crime rates, too.
A similar bubble chart (below) where bubble radius is proportional to the percent of population with bachelor’s degrees suggests that states with a higher percentage of college graduates have fewer property crimes. However, a higher percentage of college graduates does not appear to correlate with the rate of violent crime positively or negatively.
