SUMMARY - Investing in Prevention: Why Crime Reduction Doesn’t Start with Police
A city allocates ninety percent of its public safety budget to police and corrections, and ten percent to prevention, then expresses surprise that arrest rates remain high and recidivism continues, as if the resource allocation itself did not predict the outcome. A researcher calculates that every dollar invested in early childhood education returns seven dollars in reduced criminal justice costs, reduced victimization, and increased productivity - yet legislatures cut education while expanding prison budgets, the math apparently less compelling than the politics.