Anderson calculates the cost of the legal system, victim losses, crime-prevention agencies, the cost of private deterrence, the opportunity cost of victims, criminals, prisoners, and even the cost of fear from violent crime. We all bear this cost whether we have been a victim or not. Our taxes our higher, we are less safe, and respect for law and order in society has fallen. The real crime is that it is our very own criminal justice system that has generated this crime and forced this burden on the American people. Prohibition laws are a good case in point.
Prohibition causes crime and violence to increase.
In a new study for the National Bureau of Economic Research, Boston University economist Jeffrey Miron has demonstrated that there was a very strong statistical relationship between alcohol prohibition and violence. Further, David Rasmussen and Bruce Benson's 1994 book, The Economic Anatomy of a Drug War shows that the modern drug war and all of its draconian policies actually increased property and violent crimes committed on the American public and made us less safe. It is now well-established in the literature that police and drug law enforcement bureaucracies are the biggest proponents of prohibitions and are willing to use all legitimate and illegitimate means to expand their power and budgets. Scientific review of the actions of police bureaucrats and unions clearly demonstrates that they have little interest to serve and protect. Benson's To Serve and Protect is a crucial contribution because he shows convincingly that a private system would work much better than government.