The Economics of Policing and Public Safety

Abstract

The efficiency of any police action depends on the relative magnitude of its crime-reducing benefits and legitimacy costs. Policing strategies that are socially efficient at the city level may be harmful at the local level, because the distribution of direct costs and benefits of police actions that reduce victimization is not the same as the distribution of indirect benefits of feeling safe. In the United States, the local misallocation of police resources is disproportionately borne by Black and Hispanic individuals. Despite the complexity of this particular problem, the incentives facing both police departments and police officers tend to be structured as if the goals of policing were simple—to reduce crime by as much as possible. Formal data collection on the crime reducing-benefits of policing, and not the legitimacy costs, produce s further incentives to provide more engagement than may be efficient in any specific encounter, at both the officer and departmental level. There is currently little evidence as to what screening, training, or monitoring strategies are most effective at encouraging individual officers to balance the crime reducing benefits and legitimacy costs of their actions.

Understanding the best practices of public administration in the era of revolution 4.0

“…Many people are helpless against attacks and personal information theft because of social networks and the internet. Employee exit procedures, security access policies, and security awareness training, according to Owens & Ba (2021), can reduce the number of cybersecurity incidents brought on by unauthorized access to enterprise systems. If an organization wants to increase employee safety, it should build an infrastructure for information security.…”

Rewards, Sanctions, and Trust in the Police: Evidence from Colombia

“…Second, police officers and departments are tasked with crime reduction and promoting feelings of safety. At the same time, they need to maintain their legitimacy by minimizing the acts with indiscriminate or biased use of force (Owens & Ba, 2021). Recent evidence reveals that interventions aiming at replacing the fast-thinking and gut-based police behaviors with "slow-down" techniques of procedural justice reduce the use of police force and citizens' complaints (Owens et al, 2018;Wood et al, 2020).…”

“…The duality in the police objective function is accompanied by a weighting consideration between their direct and indirect benefits. Whereas the former benefits are related to crime prevention, the latter are related to making civilians feel safe and promoting the belief that the police are "doing something" about crime (Owens & Ba, 2021). Paradoxically, most benefits are indirect because only a minor percentage of the population is a direct victim of crime.…”

Understanding community safety and policing in San José, California: A qualitative and communal analysis

“…Marginalized populations such as the unhoused, individuals facing mental health challenges, and those living in poverty are often subjected to discriminatory practices (Austin et al, 2002). By examining how community members conceptualize public safety, how policing contributes to (or undermines) safety, and how a city's total budget realizes public safety, communities can reimagine how safety can be organized and practiced (Owens and Ba, 2021). The present study illuminates the perspectives and experiences of diverse community residents, attending to their conceptions of what safety could look like within a broader social project to reimagine public safety.…”

“…Of central significance to this study is how people from San José both perceived their safety and how they thought safety could be pursued in the future in a manner that is not inclusive of governmental authorities (e.g., police). This is important to understand as there are ongoing discussions around the USA about how to better hold the police accountable and if there are alternative ways to promote safety (Owens and Ba, 2021). Hence, this important research draws from emprical data to discuss how communities in a large metropolitan city perceive safety.…”