In an article at the Chicago Sun-Times staff reporter Andy Grimm says it will take $1 billion in additional spending to reduce crime in Chicago:
A report by the privately funded anti-violence program Chicago CRED estimates the city would have to spend $405 million per year for five years — in addition to what it currently spends — to reduce crime to the levels of big city peers New York or Los Angeles.
In a speech to the City Club of Chicago last month, University of Chicago Crime Lab Director Jens Ludwig suggested an even higher number: $1 billion per year for violence prevention spending and increased policing, to reduce crime in Chicago by 50%.
I guess I’m missing something. Chicago already has more police officers relative to the population than either New York or Los Angeles and spends more for them on average. What’s the difference between Chicago and either Los Angeles or New York?
What I can think of are location, demographics, patterns of residence, political corruption, and history and spending more money won’t do anything about any of them. The studies of which I’m aware do not show a direct causal relationship between increases in policing and reducing crime.
