RS 224 - Rick Nevin on "The long-term effects of lead on crime"

Release date: January 6th, 2019

Rick Nevin (Photo: The Washington Post)

This episode features Rick Nevin, an economist who is known for his research suggesting that lead is one of the main causes of crime. Rick and Julia discuss: how do we know the correlation between lead and crime is a sign of a causal relationship? Has the lead-crime theory made any successful predictions? And is it possible that getting rid of lead could reduce the crime rate down to zero?

Links 

Rick Nevin's website

"Lucifer Curves: The Legacy of Lead Poisoning" by Rick Nevin

"The Rising Curve" by Ulric Neisser

Edited by Brent Silk

Music by Miracles of Modern Science

Full Transcripts 

Comments

[Jameson]

Rick Nevin's website has some great graphs on his website that indicate a striking correlation between Lead exposure versus low IQ and crime.

The decrease in unwed pregnancy may have something to do with more readily available contraception. The increase in college attendance may have something to do with the "college for everyone" policy.

If someone really did find low levels of Lead has more impact on IQ than genetics, that would constitute a genuinely wild result. High levels of Lead obviously have a definitive effect, since they result in death.

[Krasny Vladimir]

Damn, Im gonna be of of those who say "Im no expert but.." and then continue talking....but "facts" beside, he sounds a lot like a guest of Be Reasonable podcast :-/

[Max]

Did IQ drop between 1940 and 1970?
How do whites and blacks compare after controlling for lead exposure?
Are other factors affecting IQ like mercury exposure?
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/study-iq-loss-from-mercury-costly/

[Jonas Lundholm]

All that lead that Djhengis Kahn inhaled ?

[Penny Bright]

Very interesting podcast. No doubt lead contamination is harmful and may have unforeseen downstream consequences, but it is highly unlikely that a single chemical is responsible for all human bad activity. (Even though it's fictional, the second human, living in Eden, in the bible slew his own brother out of jealousy.) Human behavior is much too complex. Dr. Gelaf should have raised this.

But it raises the thought question: if it were possible to remove all exogenous causes of violence, such as poverty, injustice, etc., would humans still hurt each other? Since it’s a thought question, my thought is: that would be a good start, but some people would still behave badly. Probably some “good behavior training,” which may take generations, would be necessary as well, to remove curb nasty human behavior.

Also, since (I believe) that lead poisoning is higher in people of color, I think it's possible that these data could be used in a racially discriminatory manner. Instead of using the data to mediate cleaning up the lead, it might be used (by people who don't understand the mechanism) in "victim blaming."