NEW from @AaronChalfin: In 1990, NYC experienced 2,220+ homicides. By 2011, it only had 515.

Then, against everyone's wildest expectations, homicides fell again.

What went right? Gang takedowns may be part of the answer.

THREAD: niskanencenter.org/how-a-focused-…
After NYC's first major homicide decline in the '90s, NYPD continued to make a concerted effort to combat violent crimes, relying on sustained surveillance of communities. This policy was best known for brief detainments called "stop-question-frisk." Image
In 2011, a lawsuit was filed alleging that the NYPD's enforcement activity constituted a pattern of racially discriminatory policing.

So NYPD began to abandon "stop-question-frisk."

Everyone predicted that crime would go up. But that's not what happened. Image
As NYPD began to wind down its policy of mass street stops, it began to invest in a very different approach. It focused intensively on the small number of people engaged in retaliatory violence.

The signature policy of the new strategy: gang takedown. Image
Evidence indicates that gang takedowns make public housing communities safer.

The takedowns may explain ~1/4 of the cumulative decline in shootings around public housing in NYC during the 2011-2018 period and >10% of the decline in shootings citywide. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.100…
The takedowns were not followed by an increase in police enforcement.

That 👏 is 👏 HUGE.

NYPD was able to meaningfully reduce gun violence in some of the city’s most disadvantaged areas w/o broadly exposing people to the criminal justice system via more arrests.
Gang takedowns, of course, raise their own challenges.
1. The reduction in violence doesn't last forever.
2. Takedowns don't help rehabilitate arrestees so that they can return to a crime-free life
3. Gang sweeps can still entangle innocent people. Image
Despite the limitations, what happened in NYC has massive implications.

Violence (esp. homicide in communities) is traumatizing.

Bad policing – an excessive focus on “quick rip” drug raids, low-quality arrests, and “juking the stats” – can be even more traumatizing.
The answer isn't less policing, but GOOD policing – more effective gang enforcement, building major cases, and conducting better gun violence investigations.

We have an increasing roster of empirical evidence and case studies to point the way. niskanencenter.org/how-a-focused-…

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More from @NiskanenCenter

Feb 3
NEW from @Robert_t_Orr: Renewing the expanded #ChildTaxCredit for ALL ages is the best way forward.

But a child allowance for children ages 6 and younger is the next best option.

Why? Because young kids are the most likely to face poverty.

MORE: niskanencenter.org/why-young-fami… Image
Workers only hit their peak earnings years between 35 and 54. So young parents tend to have fewer financial resources to invest in their child’s needs. Image
Parents of young children tend to be young themselves and are less stable financially.

But telling parents they have to wait until they have kids until they are financially stable isn't the answer here. That would have negative impacts on families and society.
Read 4 tweets
Feb 2
THREAD: #Ukrainians already in the U.S. should have a way to stay in the U.S. as tensions continue to rise. The Biden admin should prepare to protect them using two tools:

1. Temporary Protected Status (TPS)
2. Special Student Relief (SSR).
1/
nytimes.com/live/2022/02/0…
DHS can designate a country for TPS due to ongoing armed conflict, environmental disaster, or other circumstances, like threat of invasion, etc. TPS would allow eligible Ukrainians in the U.S. to remain here until they could return home safely. 2/ uscis.gov/humanitarian/t…
Imagine if the U.S. sent Ukrainians into an unstable/violent situation simply because their visas ran out. Issuing TPS is a straightforward way to prevent this from becoming reality, and the Biden administration should prepare to protect Ukrainians in the U.S. now. 3/
Read 5 tweets
Sep 9, 2021
NEW REPORT+THREAD: The price tags of essential services like education, child care, etc., are out of control.

The progressive approach? Socialize the costs.

But cutting regulations that limit the supply of these services is the ONLY way to address the root of the problem.
The problem with the progressive approach of guaranteeing affordability via subsidies is:

(1) Public debts/deficits can’t grow without limit
(2) Subsidies will cover up the bloat and waste and drive costs up further (we’ll throw out a few examples).
But the budget hawks who, out of concern for the national debt advocate for spending cuts across the board, ignore the real expenses that Americans face.

In the end, Americans will support the subsidies over this backwards-facing approach.
Read 17 tweets
Aug 26, 2021
NEW REPORT + THREAD: Most middle-class people don’t realize it, but the eventual need for long-term care (LTC) will force many of them to drain their savings and face impoverishment.

This is arguably the biggest hole in the American social safety net. niskanencenter.org/how-to-fix-lon…
Medicare doesn’t cover long term care expenses, forcing people to pay out of pocket unless they are poor enough to qualify for Medicaid or are among the few with private LTC insurance

A huge swath of the middle-class will be forced to burn through their savings in short order.
The problem is urgent: The # of people over 85 will triple between 2015 and 2050, reports @JStein_WaPo. The # of individuals requiring long-term care is set to increase dramatically from 14 million to 24 million by 2030.
washingtonpost.com/business/econo…
Read 12 tweets
Aug 24, 2021
NEW REPORT w/ @cleanaircatf: To manage climate change, the U.S. must double or triple the size of its electric transmission system - and the current piecemeal approach isn’t going to cut it.

We’ve got 2 proposals to scale transmission rapidly: niskanencenter.org/report-how-are…
To make progress, the U.S. must address the tension between private and public interest. It will also need to find inclusive ways to plan and develop transmission in the national interest that gets buy-in by ensuring broad enough benefits as well as compensation for burdens.
#Transmission building today is a fragmented “3 P” system:

✔️Permitting
✔️Planning
✔️Paying

This is scattered over dozens of federal / state / local authorities. The result? A lengthy process subject to multiple vetoes.
Read 10 tweets
Jun 23, 2021
NEW PAPER and THREAD: The waiting list for green cards has grown well into the millions.

The wait times = decades.

Cost to the U.S. economy = billions.

Recapturing these green cards is possible and will add billions to the U.S. GDP.
niskanencenter.org/stop-the-incin…
Administrative errors and #COVID19 have left hundreds of thousands of green card slots unused.

(Want more on how GCs work and why we have the slots that we have? See this from @chooseboundless).
boundless.com/immigration-re…
Just how bad is the green card backlog? @catoinstitute’s @David_J_Bier has found that the employment-based green card backlog surpassed 1.2 million applicants last year and could double by FY 2030.
cato.org/blog/employmen…
Read 17 tweets

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