In the previous post we have covered the influence of racial unrest on the police. In this post we will thoroughly examine the meaning of the slogan “Defund the police”.
The slogan “Defund the police” itself presumes that municipalities will either decrease the police funding or cut it all. First of all, does increasing police budget helps? The Washington Post study[1] says that despite the fact that the police budget was growing for the past 60 years the number of crimes since 1960s has not dropped but increased by 50% annually.[2] According to the inflation rate in the US[3] since 1960s up to 2021 the overall price increase was 829% or roughly a little more than 8 times. Thus, it means that the expenditure on police considering inflation grew on 400% and the number of crimes had only increased. On paper it really looks like defunding police will not worsen the situation because increasing the funding does not help. However, lets look on the actual cases. Happened in Texas, San-Antonio. The sheriff requested money on buying a patrol boat. The officials responded that “they are not willing to spend on that shiny new toy”.[4] Despite the Sheriffs arguments for the necessity of a patrol boat, local commissioners refused to provide the funds. Nobody would never hear about this situation between the sheriff and officials until one police received a 911 call about sinking boat. It took 50 minutes to find a boat to rescue the family stuck in a lake. Until the famous veteran wrote off a check[5] to the police department. The association also spoke out against the politician responsible for not fulfilling the needs of the police department on Instagram.[6] Another example of police having problem with funding took place long before BLM riots. In 2017 Baltimore, Maryland,[7] a suspect fired more than 100 shots before he was finally downed by the police. It happened because all the 8 officers around simply did not have the patrol rifles on them.
Anyway, in our next post we will look more precisely how different cities changed their attitude to police in terms of funding. Maybe we will be able to figure out a correlation between regions, ethnic makeup, or party affiliation.
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[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/06/07/over-past-60-years-more-spending-police-hasnt-necessarily-meant-less-crime/
[2] In 1960, about $2 billion was spent by state and local governments on police. There were about 1,887 crimes per 100,000 Americans, including 161 violent crimes. Spending spiked to more than $67 billion in 2018, the most recent year for which full data are available — crime rates had fallen further to 2,580 crimes per 100,000, including 381 violent crimes.
[3] https://www.worlddata.info/america/usa/inflation-rates.php#:~:text=During%20the%20observation%20period%20from,at%20the%20beginning%20of%202022.
[4] https://sanantonioreport.org/bexar-county-sheriffs-office-infamous-boat/
[5] Picture 1
[6] Picture 2
[7] https://www.baltimoresun.com/maryland/baltimore-county/bs-md-co-bus-shooting-video-20170627-story.html
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