[jacquesm]

Police and profitability should not be mixed. Whether it costs $50 or $500 / hour to work on a case technically should not even be an issue. The cumulative effect of a lot of small-time crime on a society can be as large as a bank robbery, even if the robbery is a much more serious crime by itself.

[bphogan]

But it is an issue because it's tax dollars, and people don't like paying taxes.

[jon889]

People wouldn’t mind paying taxes as much if they knew where it was going, instead of it going into a black box and no one really sure if it all makes it out to the needed services.

[xyzzyz]

Very, very, very little of the taxes are spent on law enforcement. You could quadruple their budget, and nobody would notice the tax increase.