Disbanding police departments doesn't affect crime levels, says new report

According to new research from Rice University, shifting law enforcement responsibilities to county governments doesn't seem to have an effect on crime rates. The study shows that those communities may be less likely to report their crime statistics to the FBI.

The recent edition of the Journal of Urban Economics contains a question about the police department.

A professor of economics at Rice, Richard Boylan, wrote a book in 2002 about the reasons for the dissolution of police departments in some cities. He compared their crime data, police-related deaths, traffic fatalities and spending on law enforcement with that of comparable cities that kept their police departments intact.

17 million Americans lived in cities that did not have their own police departments in 2020. These cities are located in large metropolitan areas.

Some citiesOutsource their police services to other government entities for a variety of reasons, including dissatisfaction with local police services or a desire to save money.

There was a problem with the crime data reported to the FBI by localities that dissolved their police departments. The communities were less likely to report their crime statistics to the FBI.

There was a drop in major crimes per 100,000 people in the communities that reported to the database. The National Center for Health Statistics reported that the number of homicides in the cities that had their police departments dissolved did not change.

According to Boylan, outsourcing city police services to county governments decreases municipal spending on policing by $70 a year per capita. He found that if all of a county's municipalities outsourcing their police services, the sheriff's office would spend an additional $90.80 per capita. The number of crimes reported for counties increases by an amount equal to the decrease in the number of crimes reported by the city.

Boylan said that neither side of the argument to defund the police will be happy with the findings.

Police-related deaths, which include officers killing citizens and fatal medical emergencies suffered during interactions with police, have fallen in cities that have outsourcing. Boylan found that the economic benefit from the drop in deaths is likely to be more than the value of a statistical life.

More information: Richard T. Boylan, Should cities disband their police departments?, Journal of Urban Economics (2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.jue.2022.103460