Every American is wary of crime. It’s just a reality. Even though violent crime has actually trended down in recent years nationwide (despite the hefty contribution of statistics from Chicago, St. Louis, Detroit and Baltimore), we live in a 24-hour news cycle so crime leads news on a regular, hyperkinetic basis.

Additionally, sensationalized news makes it worse by focusing on any crime, inferring that it is more an issue than it is.

Still, if one were to remove the violent crime stats from the nation’s five most crime plagued cities (ironically mostly cities with strong gun control laws preventing civilians from defending themselves), this is not a violent country relative to the world.

North Dakota has its share of crime of all sorts. Certainly the opioid epidemic has increased those numbers. There is every reason to be wary of crime.

Still a new report shows North Dakota ranked #7 as the least worried state in the country in a recent SafeWise Survey.

According to those releasing the results, “With crime rates below national averages, that tracks. North Dakotans probably worry more about the polar vortex or being in debt than they do about someone breaking into their house or getting robbed in the streets. Although 64 percent of North Dakota respondents said they worried about identity theft.”

The latter is no surprise. As common as domestic violence and drug-driven crime have become, scam and identity theft crimes are those most cited by callers to Minot Daily News. And they do seem to be common here, and they are insidious and target the most vulnerable.

But at least this isn’t Chicago, and residents seem to know it.

Thank goodness.