I just read this story linked by Lew Rockwell.com, about California police shootings. The article mentions that a number of California police districts have had soiled pasts of deadly shootings and they commonly complain of low budgets and an innability to afford non deadly force technologies such as stun guns, pepper spray, and rubber bullets.

This struck me as interesting, and I thought it warranted a bit of economic thinking. Why are some things cheaper than others on the market, despite similar if not superior ends met by their more expensive alternatives? The die-hard price theorist says “supply and demand,” and calls it a day. What that means in this case is that traditional lethal weapons such as bullets and guns are cheaper than non-violent alternatives because they are more easily available at the given level of demand. But what explains the given level of demand, and what incentivizes the entrepenuerial process to provide alternatives for this demand?
I can’t help but think about the implications on the markets for these technologies under different institutional conditions than what we have (state monopolized police, and justice). If police agencies were privatized or individuals could seek damages against state police officers making false arrests or using excessive violence, then the costs of using these technologies may change drastically. Lethal weapons result in deaths and expose the officer or officer’s agency to a host of liabilities and potential costs, while rubber bullets and non leathal alternatives, require marginal additional training. In the immediate institutional context the only cost benefit analysis that gets performed is by the police agency viewing financial costs as price tags on traditional weapons compared to non-violent alternatives. The concept of additional liabilities doesn’t get factored in because they’re a state agency and this has a drastic effect on the capital structure of the related technologies pertinent to the industry.