 | This paper estimates the effects on crime from increased spending on police by studying the 2009 competition for officer hiring grants carried out by the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS Office). Because the competition was oversubscribed, the COPS Office ranked applicants in descending order using a score derived from their responses to application questions and distributed $1 billion in grants until the funding was exhausted. Using a regression discontinuity (RD) design, we show that receipt of COPS Office grant funding increased the size of police forces in 2009 by almost 2 percent relative to 2007-2008. In the following years, we find suggestive evidence that total crime rates declined from their baseline levels by almost 5 percent. Finally, we find some evidence that arrest rates decreased as well, suggesting that deterrence may be a key mechanism behind this effect.By Philip J. Cook, Max Kapustin, Jens Ludwig, Douglas L. MillerCategories: Data and AnalysisLanguage: EnglishPublic link
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