Our Expats In Mexico Survey 2020, which launches today with this blog, will focus on the personal safety perceptions of expats in Mexico. We think it’s an important topic that needs more perspective.
Public perceptions about personal safety in Mexico often don’t match the reality of personal experiences and hard data. Take for example this perceptual problem most expats are familiar with: Although many Mexican cities are as safe as most cities of comparable size in the U.S. and Canada, most of the media, by focusing on coverage of drug cartel executions, create a perception that the whole country is wracked with violence.
We would be sticking our collective heads in the sand if we did not agree that personal safety in Mexico is a major problem in certain areas of the country. For example, cities along the U.S. border and other cities and regions where cartels battle for lucrative new territory. The state of Guanajuato has been in the news this past year as violence has increased because of these territorial drug wars.
We will be covering personal safety in Mexico in a big way in March with a new article based not only on the latest Mexican government crime statistics, but also the 26th National Survey on Urban Public Security that was just released by the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI). This new study sampled security perceptions in 70 cities in the country and found that about seven-out-10 of those surveyed believe their city is not safe.
Do these perceptual numbers match the actual levels of crime in each of these cities? Which cities are perceived as safe? Do expat perceptions match those of Mexican citizens?
We will have comparisons in our March article on personal safety in Mexico. Most importantly, we will include the results of our new survey, which measures the specific perceptions of personal safety by expats living in Mexico.
We field a new survey each January and February to find out what expats living in Mexico and aspiring expats from primarily the U.S. and Canada think about a wide range of topics. One of our previous questions was, “Have you ever had a crime committed against you in Mexico?” About 80 percent said no.
Our new Expats In Mexico Survey 2020 will focus exclusively on expats living in Mexico and what they feel about personal safety in their Mexican hometowns. We’ll compare what they perceive versus perceptions in the new INEGI study versus the reality of crime statistics from the Mexican government.
To make this a success, we need your involvement. The survey is just 10 questions and should take less than three minutes of your time. If you are an expat living in Mexico, this is the URL for the survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/5BN5N22
Gracias for participating!
