The Clinton definition of “false choice” is when two alternatives are presented as mutually exclusive that really aren’t. For example, we need not choose between a balanced budget and helping the poor.
Tyler Cowen presents its converse, from Peter Moskos:
An innovative analysis by Eric Cadora highlights “million-dollar blocks” — individual city blocks where more than one million dollars per block per year are spent to incarcerate individuals from that block. Some blocks cost over five million dollars per year…A million dollars, coincidentally, is roughly what it would cost to pay for one patrol officer, twenty-four hours a day, every day for one year.
The implication being that it would be so much better to pay for the engaged patrol officer than to incarcerate a bunch of people.
I agree, but I don’t think it’s a simple either/or choice. Preusmably, that patrol officer would occasionally respond to a crime. And responding to it would ultimately lead to someone being incarcerated. Having a patrol officers might reduce the number of incidents that escalate to that level, but it wouldn’t reduce it to zero. Plus, those from the block already incarcerated for long sentences would continue to be there.
I’m all for finding more productive responses to crime than incarceration. But it’s not a simple substitution.
