Introduction

In this chapter, we look at two opposing explanations for DMC. One, differential involvement, states that DMC is due to minority youth committing crimes at a much higher rate than White youth, which, in turn, means DMC is simply a reflection of higher rates of criminality, rather than systemic racism. The other explanation is differential treatment, which, consistent with both historical and current treatment of non-White youth, suggests that differential treatment is the cause of DMC, just as differential treatment impacts non-White youth in all areas of American society. Borowski's definition of Occam's Razor best describes the focus of this chapter, in which we outline that DMC appears strikingly similar to all other areas of racism, and differential treatment should be presumed the likely cause of DMC according to the principle of removing unnecessary assumptions when distinguishing between two theories.

According to the US Census, the following percentages of the population in 2019 identified as the following racial/ethnic categories:

• • Latinx/Hispanic 18.5 percent

• • Black/African American alone 13.4 percent

• • Asian alone 5.9 percent

• • Native American alone 1.3 percent

• • White alone 76.3 percent

• • Nat. Hawaiian/Pac Islander alone 0.2 percent

• • Two or more races 2.8 percent

• • White alone, not Hispanic/Latinx 60.1 percent

These percentages represent those who identified solely as one of the racial/ethnic groups.

If race does not matter, we would expect about 13 percent of CEOs to be Black, 19 percent to be Latinx, 6 percent to be Asian, 1 percent to be Native American, 76 percent to be White (because of rounding, this totals more than 100 percent) and, for ethnicity, 19 percent to be Latinx. middle class, those with a high school degree as their highest level of education, those who own a home and so forth to be Black. We would expect to see the same proportional representation for all racial/ethnic groups throughout both the “good” and “bad” elements of society.