New York City has the biggest police budget of any city in the United States. In 2020, the New York Police Department spent $6 billion. But the true cost of the police is well above $10 billion a year. Most of that goes to uniformed officers’ salaries, pension, and overtime. As police budgets have risen, the extra policing hasn’t necessarily led to less crime. Instead, record-high settlements in police misconduct cases, unconstitutional policing policies, and high-profile deaths of Black New Yorkers have called the budget into question. Following the death of George Floyd, New Yorkers took to the streets, calling for a $1 billion cut to the 2021 NYPD budget. But the real cuts amounted to only about $420 million.
