Featured Articles: Introducing #PlatformPitches

#PlatformPitches is the name we’ve given to our new series of articles, offering suggestions to the Republican ticket. There are now two articles in the series:

Introducing #PlatformPitches: Our Suggestions for the Republican Ticket

#PlatformPitches: Time For A New COPS Program

First, we apologize for the lateness of today’s briefing, due to a medical issue related to your correspondent’s surgery recovery.

Thought of the Day: Clearance Rates Are A Basic Indicator Of State Capacity

In the 1960s, police cleared (through arrest or exceptional means) around 90% of homicides. By 2020, that rate had fallen to about 54%. For other violent crimes like aggravated assault, clearance rates dropped from over 80% to under 50%. Property crimes have seen even steeper declines, with burglary clearances falling from over 50% in the 1960s to around 14% in 2020.

This long-term deterioration accelerated sharply after 2020, with homicide clearance rates falling below 50% for the first time on record. The inability to solve such a high proportion of serious crimes strikes at the very foundation of the state’s legitimacy and its social contract with citizens. When the vast majority of violent and property crimes go unsolved, it signals a fundamental breakdown in public order and the rule of law. This emboldens criminals, erodes public trust in institutions, and leaves victims without justice or closure. This is one of the fundamental duties of the state, and it strikes at its very core.

RELATED: #PlatformPitches: Time For A New COPS Program

ALSO RELATED: Heartwarming video from El Salvador President about retraining non-violent offenders.

Policy News You Need This Morning

#AffirmativeAction – MIT is the first prestigious university to release its racial admissions stats in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision banning racial preferences in admissions. The share of black students plummetted and the share of Asian students increased. It remains to be seen whether other elite colleges will release their numbers and whether there will be a meaningful difference.

#Stats – We are very curious to know what happened here. The Labor Department issued revised figures for the 12 months through March, and it turns out that 818,000 fewer jobs were added across that period than previously reported.

#HigherEd – We covered this previously: FREOPP, Avik Roy’s think tank, has gone into granular detail and calculated the ROI of every college degree. This is an impressive data set. Here comes the next step: ROI-based student loan reform. “Rather than forgiving student debt, the federal government should stop subsidizing degrees with a negative return on investment,” writes FREOPP’s Jon Hartley. Sounds good to us.

#Alcoholism – Welcome initiative from the Niskanen Center: the SOBER Act authorizes the appropriation of $50 million over five years to “create, sustain, and expand 24/7 Sobriety programs and collect data to assess their impact on crime, recidivism, and incarceration.” According to the Center, “24/7 Sobriety programs are a game-changer in reducing alcohol-related crimes. Participants face swift sanctions for violations, leading to fewer arrests and lower mortality rates.” More here.

#FamilyPolicy – New study on the impact of paternity leave on child development. The study authors use extensions of paternity leave in Spain as a natural experiment. “Eligibility for four additional weeks of paternity leave led to a significant 12 percentage-point increase in the fraction of children with developmental delays.” You read that right: increase. Somewhat in line with results from a similar study in Sweden which found that paternity leave led to lower grades for children of non-college-educated fathers.

#Antitrust – R Street’s Josh Withrow with the case against the Google search decision.

#Immigraton – The CBP has just released its July numbers for the border and ports of entry. The bottomline from CIS: “The kind-of good news: Border Patrol apprehensions are down. The bad news: Everything else.”

Chart of the Day

Yes, we have posted this chart before. But it is so striking, and relevant to today’s Thought of the Day, that we felt we should do it again.

Meme of the Day