Yes, more policing burdens disadvantaged communities. But it benefits them, too.

The authors looked at 38 years of police employment data for America’s 242 largest cities, not just to see the policing’s effect on crime, but specifically, what its differential impacts were on different racial groups. In tune with earlier research, they found that bigger police forces reduced “index” crime — serious offenses such as violence, burglary or robbery. Depending on the exact model, they found that hiring somewhere between 10 and 17 new officers averted one homicide every year. And as the opponents of the “defund police” movement have suggested, this indeed disproportionately benefited Black communities: “In per capita terms,” they write, “the effects are approximately twice as large for Black victims.”