Melbourne is a really safe city to live in. There are 3 main factors that contribute to the level of safety：

1) Education – People who attend high school and university together can form strong social ties， which are associated with lower levels of crime.

3) Opportunity – Higher educated people are more likely to find well paid jobs and therefore to not engage in criminal activities out of necessity.

The data here shows the percentage of residents who completed Year 12 (Aus high school equivalent) and some other indicators of economic opportunity. You can see how each area compares against the national average on this gov.au page as well [PDF]. One thing you need to bear in mind when looking at these statistics is that they give an impression of ‘risk’ rather than showing actual incident rates. For example I could move to Blackburn（一个比较low income的地区） tomorrow and never be involved in any crime because there aren't enough opportunities for me to be exposed to risk. The data is also based on census data and doesn't take recent increases in some crime rates into account.

In my experience（在澳大利亚的两年中），it's pretty hard to get robbed or attacked in Melbourne， but you do hear stories and read news reports of random attacks happening in public places. As a single female，I felt very protected and able to walk around by myself at night and didn't perceive much risk of physical aggression until I moved to UK. In terms of sexual assaults，my friends and I experienced cat-calling and unwanted advances from men on public transport，which we found very disturbing and disconcerting but nothing too serious. Overall，the level of aggression and crime I saw was on par with what I'd seen reported in newspapers back in China——so perhaps nothing has changed.

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