evidence: Previous research suggests that more police on the streets leads to reductions in crime (Chalfin et al., 2022). Consistent with most other areas of economic activity, New York spends more per resident on police than Florida ($552 versus $438). This difference suggests that New York’s higher spending on police contributes to the state’s lower crime rate. Another potentially important driver of criminal activity is the incarceration rate, which at the national level has fallen significantly during the past decade. Perhaps not surprisingly given its much higher crime rates, Florida’s incarceration rate in 2019 was more than twice that of New York’s (870 versus 420 per 100,000 adults) (BJS, 2021). Despite this difference, New York actually spends more per state resident on incarceration than does Florida ($331 versus $223), with this difference potentially driven by higher salaries or more personnel per inmate in state prisons and local jails. [...] With respect to other measures of well-being that can be affected by government policy, New York scores well due to its high health insurance coverage and low rates of both crime and incarceration relative to Florida and the rest of the U.S. However, an area of concern is that New York has a very high rate of homelessness and low high school graduation rates. In contrast, Florida has low health insurance coverage and high incarceration but low homelessness and relatively high school graduation rates.