Just how wicked and criminal is today’s Hong Kong?
A layman’s comparison of the crime rates of the United States and Hong Kong for the year 1960, as published by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Hong Kong Police Department respectively, gives an objective picture of their relative lawlessness.
Both sets of figures are for predominantly urban areas, covering ten of the most comparable categories of crime. The figures give the actual number of crimes per one million population. Because of inherent differences in the manner of classifying and reporting crimes, a margin of error of ten percent should be allowed in their interpretation.
1960—CRIME RATES PER 1 MILLION POPULATION
| CRIME CATEGORY | UNITED STATES | HONG KONG |
|---|---|---|
| Murder | 55 | 8 |
| Rape | 74 | 50 |
| Serious Assault | 645 | 178 |
| Burglary | 1,358 | 157 |
| Larceny | 2,785 | 2,562 |
| Forgery | 234 | 60 |
| Prostitution | 319 | 527 |
| Narcotics | 289 | 4,677 |
| Drunkenness | 16,375 | 257 |
| Robbery | 361 | 30 |
Such statistics are always subject to many different interpretations, which will not be made here. But they confirm one impression shared by virtually everyone who has spent many nights (either at home or on the streets) in both New York City and Hong Kong: You’re a lot safer in Hong Kong.
The most glaring disparity between the rates is, of course, in the comparative number of arrests for drunkenness. The American rate is more than 60 times higher than that of Hong Kong, and it is a safe inference that a fair share of the colony arrests for drunkenness are made among Europeans and Americans, who comprise less than two percent of the population. Hundreds of thousands of Chinese in Hong Kong drink beer, wine or hard liquor, but a Chinese drunk in public is a rarity.
In major crimes of violence—murder, rape, serious assault and robbery—America has a much higher crime rate. With the stated allowance for error, the United States and Hong Kong could be considered about equally inclined toward larceny—a legal term which covers the more popular forms of stealing. Stealing automobiles, however, has not really caught on in the colony; there is practically no place to hide a car after stealing it. Bicycle theft is more common there.
Prostitution is one of the two categories in which Hong Kong has a higher rate than America. A highly intelligent missionary who has dealt with the problem for many years had this succinct comment: