Here at Milwaukee Record, we employ a sentient machine known as the Great Job, Milwaukee! Bot to keep track of the city’s many appearances on dopey online lists. In the past, the infernal machine has brought us news that Rolling Stone liked Summerfest, The New York Times thought Milwaukee was a “cursed sports city,” and somebody claimed we were the 5th least attractive city in America. Today, in sadly sarcastic “Great Job, Milwaukee!” news, “financial news and opinion company” 24/7 Wall St. has deemed Milwaukee the 5th most dangerous city in America.

What sort of methodology did 24/7 Wall St. use to identify the 25 most dangerous U.S. cities? Well…

To identify the 25 most dangerous U.S. cities, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed violent crime rates in cities with at least 100,000 people from the FBI’s 2015 Uniform Crime Report released Monday. The total number and rates of murder, non negligent manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault, which are included in the violent crime rate, as well as burglaries, larceny, motor vehicle theft, and arson—all classified as property crime—also came from the FBI’s report. We also considered these data for each year from 2011 through 2015. Annual unemployment rates for 2015 came from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Median household income, poverty rates, the percentage of adults with at least a bachelor’s degree, population, and the percentage of adults with at least a high school diploma came from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS).

Well okay then. So what did the site have to say about Milwaukee? Well…

5. Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Violent crimes per 100,000: 1,596.1
> 2015 murders: 145
> Poverty rate: 29.4%
> Unemployment rate: 6.7%

Even as the nation’s population increased by 3.2% over the five years ending in 2015, violent crime fell by 0.7% over that period. In Milwaukee, however, although the population rose by just 0.5%, the number of violent crimes rose by 60.5%—from less than 6,000 incidents to more than 9,500. In just five years, the city moved from the 29th most dangerous city to the fifth most dangerous among major U.S. cities. A major driver of that increase was aggravated assault incidents—the number of aggravated assaults nearly doubled during that time.

Well okay then. “Topping” Milwaukee in the list of dangerous cities are Memphis, Tennessee (#4); Birmingham, Alabama (#3); Detroit, Michigan (#2); and St. Louis, Missouri (#1).

About The Author

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Co-Founder and Editor

Matt Wild weighs between 140 and 145 pounds. He lives on Milwaukee's east side.