Self explanatory is it not?
Those countries where people have grown towards reason and logic instead of clinging to religion and superstition, etc, have EVOLVED a higher and better collective conscience and moral standard in comparision to those who still remain clinging to the straws of religion.

Right path? The were designed to control people.

I disagree with your first sentence - I think organised religion has always been about power and control. The reason why the most developed and happiest countries have less crime and less religion is due to a lot of different factors though.

I reckon excellent education, state funded medical care, a comprehensive social safety net and a prison system focused on rehabilitation might have more to do with it. Oh, and booze is really expensive, so alcohol fuelled violent crime is a lot less common.

I absolutely disagree with your first sentence.
Gods and religions were created to explain natural phenomena that
the ancients did not yet understand.
Those in power recognized that religion made people easier to control,
and lead.
Religion made it possible for bad behavior to be "forgiven".

Places like the Scandinavian countries, had most of their gods and religion
fall into mythology, where all gods and religion belong.

As far as the crime rate goes, there has always been crime.
The greater the population, the more crime.
It's not "inexplicable".
It's about the numbers.

In Scandinavian countries the welfare state provides a decent, even comfortable standard of living for everyone, including college education, health care, housing, food, etc., so there is no need to rob anybody to get by or afford things. In more pure capitialist countries like America, crime is the only real choice for some unless they want to live in poverty, crime or joining the military, I should say, which in some cases is not that much higher on the scale of morality...

Religions are not created with a view of leading people to the right path. They are created out of fear, ignorance, and feelings of helplessness. Then a dogma arises, which in turns, seems to lead to the creation of a priestly cult which becomes the platform for demagoguery of the dogma.

No, not a reason for leading to the right path, it is only a reason to control. Power is what it is all about and some peoples need for "we are so special, and therefore there has to be something else after death".

Like others here, I disagree with your first sentence. The "right path" may be the intended selling point for a religion, but I feel that its use by governments to control the people creates an oppressive environment for some.

In countries where the religion is so outdated that it can not jive with the modern world we see around us, then it's really of no use, and perhaps is backfiring, by creating confusion and a rebellious atmosphere.

I think people are happiest when they are in control of their own spiritual beliefs which are then evidenced by what they see in the world around them. I wonder if a happiness quotient might also factor into the crime statistics.

so two things to consider: 1) crime may appear low if it goes unreported 2) if you consider percentage vs numbers per capita the outcome is drastical different.

Bottom line: don't believe the numbers' check how the math was done; it's very very easy to lie and exaggerate with statistics.

Start with a fairly homogeneous population and a long standing culture of social support.
If you run a regression model of countries using religion or lack of as an identifier and set crime and other socioeconomic conditions as independent variables. You will find low to no correlation of Atheism or Religion to Crime. The single best predictor of crime is the gini coefficient.

Inexplicable!??!

Because it’s colder! There is, according to research a rape season in USA, being July and August. There is a dramatic drop in rose events in December, January, February.

Religion is a spurious variable in your question. The underlying explanatory factor for lower crime is less economic inequality, a greater social safety net, and a rehabilitative criminal justice system in the Nordic countries.

Religions were created out of wonderment and then used as a form of control.

If religions really were created to lead people on the right path, I think manipulative sociopaths have twisted message over the last millenia.
Unless I have misunderstood it; obedience to gods - and those who claim to speak for them while they are absent - is the highest virtue in most.

All seems a little anacdotal, in Britain less than 50% of people associate with any religion, and crime levels are rising and rising.

The premise is wrong. Religion was a collection of stories of story tellers on foot but later used selectively as guidance and dictates.

Is it really a question? Are you suggesting that religion causes crime? There are professionally conducted studies that show the exact opposite.

You have to be careful with statistics. The prevalence of religion in a country could be for various reasons, and the crime rate also might be high or low depending on social conditions. I think you’d have to look at groups within the country. Is it the deeply religious people who pray daily, study scriptures and attend religious services who are committing the crimes?

I’m not sold on your assertions. Religious people live in all countries, even in the Scandinavian countries.
People don’t follow any particular religion in most countries—in the US for example.

Religions evolve with a goal of understanding the truth about how we got here.

you guys are completely missing the law of jante in your calculations.