economic disparity

"As Eric Michael Johnson writes for Scientific American, the biggest contributor to homicide in the U.S. is not mental illness, addictions or even the accessibility of guns. It's economic disparity: the wider the gap between the rich and poor, the more violence a population breeds. Describing an analysis of homicide rates in 50 states conducted by Harvard’s Ichiro Kawachi, Johnson writes "The results were unambiguous: when income inequality was higher, so was the rate of homicide. Income inequality alone explained 74% of the variance in murder rates and half of the aggravated assaults. However, social capital had an even stronger association and, by itself, accounted for 82% of homicides and 61% of assaults. Other factors such as unemployment, poverty, or number of high school graduates were only weakly associated and alcohol consumption had no connection to violent crime at World Bank sponsored study subsequently confirmed these results on income inequality concluding that, worldwide, homicide and the unequal distribution of resources are inextricably tied."