New High In US Prison Numbers
By N.C. Aizenman
The Washington Post

Friday 29 February 2008

Growth attributed to more stringent sentencing laws.
More than one in 100 adults in the United States is in jail or prison, an all-time high that is costing state governments nearly $50 billion a year and the federal government $5 billion more, according to a report released yesterday.

With more than 2.3 million people behind bars, the United States leads the world in both the number and percentage of residents it incarcerates, leaving far-more-populous China a distant second, according to a study by the nonpartisan Pew Center on the States.

The growth in prison population is largely because of tougher state and federal sentencing imposed since the mid-1980s. Minorities have been particularly affected: One in nine black men ages 20 to 34 is behind bars. For black women ages 35 to 39, the figure is one in 100, compared with one in 355 for white women in the same age group.

The report compiled and analyzed data from several sources, including the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics and Bureau of Prisons and each state's department of corrections. It did not include individuals detained for noncriminal immigration violations.

Although studies generally find that imprisoning more offenders reduces crime, the effect may be less influential than changes in the unemployment rate, wages, the ratio of police officers to residents and the proportion of young people in the population, report co-author Adam Gelb said.

In addition, when it comes to preventing repeat offenses by nonviolent criminals - who make up about half of the incarcerated population - less-expensive punishments such as community supervision, electronic monitoring and mandatory drug counseling might prove as much or more effective than jail.

For instance, Florida, which has almost doubled its prison population over the past 15 years, has experienced a smaller drop in crime than New York, which, after a brief increase, has reduced its number of inmates to below the 1993 level.

"There is no question that putting violent and chronic offenders behind bars lowers the crime rate and provides punishment that is well deserved," said Gelb, who as director of the Center's Public Safety Performance Project advises states on developing alternatives to incarceration. "On the other hand, there are large numbers of people behind bars who could be supervised in the community safely and effectively at a much lower cost - while also paying taxes, paying restitution to their victims and paying child support."

Sociologist James Q. Wilson, who in the 1980s helped develop the "broken windows" theory that smaller crimes must be punished to deter more serious ones, agreed that sentences for some drug crimes were too long. However, Wilson disagreed that the rise in the U.S. prison population should be considered a cause for alarm: "The fact that we have a large prison population by itself is not a central problem because it has contributed to the extraordinary increase in public safety we have had in this country."

About 91 percent of incarcerated adults are under state or local jurisdiction. And the report also documents the tradeoffs state governments have faced as they devote larger shares of their budgets to house them. For instance, over the past two decades, state spending on corrections (adjusted for inflation) increased 127 percent; spending on higher education rose 21 percent.

Five states - Vermont, Michigan, Oregon, Connecticut and Delaware - now spend as much as or more on corrections as on higher education. Locally, Maryland is near the top, spending 74 cents on corrections for every dollar it spends on higher education. Virginia spends 60 cents on the dollar.

Despite reaching its latest milestone, the nation's incarcerated population has been growing more slowly since 2000 than it did during the 1990s, when harsher sentencing laws began to take effect. These included a 1986 federal law (since revised) mandating prison terms for crack cocaine offenses that were up to eight times as long as for those involving powder cocaine. In the 1990s, many states adopted "three-strikes-you're-out" laws and curtailed the powers of parole boards.

Many state systems also send offenders back to prison for technical violations of their parole or probation, such as failing a drug test or missing an appointment with a supervisory officer. A 2005 study of California's system, for example, found that more than two-thirds of parolees were being returned to prison within three years of release, 40 percent for technical infractions.

"We're just stuck in this carousel that people get off of, then get right back on again," said Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton, who as New York City police commissioner in the 1990s oversaw a significant reduction in crime.

Because of these policy shifts, the nationwide prison population swelled by about 80 percent from 1990 to 2000, increasing by as much as 86,000 a year. By contrast, from 2007 to 2008, that population increased by 25,000, a 2 percent rise.

The U.S. Supreme Court has recently issued decisions giving judges more leeway under mandatory sentencing laws, and a number of states - including Texas, which has the country's second-highest incarceration rate - are seeking to reduce their prison population by adopting alternative punishments.

Last year, Maryland officials began developing a new risk-assessment system to ensure that low-level offenders are not kept in jail longer than necessary, said Shannon Avery, executive director of a policy planning division of the state's Department of Public Safety.

"That's what you have to do when you don't have enormous amounts of tax dollars available for building prisons," she said.

Among the early innovators that states can look to is Virginia, which overhauled its system for sentencing nonviolent offenders in the mid-1990s. Although the state's incarceration rate remains relatively high, Virginia has managed to slow the growth of its prison population substantially and reduce the share of its budget spent on corrections while still reducing its crime rate.

State judges use a point system to weigh factors believed to predict a lawbreaker's likelihood of becoming a repeat offender or otherwise pose a threat to public safety. Those deemed low risk are given alternative sentences. As a result, the share of Virginia prison beds occupied by nonviolent convicts has dropped, from 40 percent in 1994 to 23 percent in 2007.

"The idea is to make a distinction between the people we're afraid of and the ones we're just ticked off at," said Rick Kern, director of the Virginia Criminal Sentencing Commission. "Not that you shouldn't punish them. But if it's going to cost $27,500 a year to keep them locked up, then maybe we should be smarter about how we do it."

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Wow, one in one hundred of us are in jail. That is astounding!!!

build a fence around america and imprison us all

does halliburton run any prisons yet?

Kinda sounds like it huh? I am shocked

They are too busy bilking the system in Iraq and Afghan

I heard somewhere that THIS IS the PRISON PLANET!! I think lots of those people in prison have committed no real Constitutional crimes ( not harmed or damaged anyone)

well, we are a country of laws arent we. for better or for worse that is what the legislative branch had thrownin our laps.

abide by the laws that we (by proxy) elected officials to write and enforce, OR pay the piper.

dont do the crime if you cant do the time- i remember hearing that somewhere.

unless of course you have enough cash and status to get away with murder...(hmmmmm, for some reason OJ comes to mind). And what about the execs from Enron??? White collar crime has its own rules I guess.....so yea if you can afford to pay the piper you're gonna walk free and easy....

OMG it must be another zionist conspiracy. Gee if you break the law you go to jail what a sinister concept. Yes sometimes people slip through the cracks, O.J. is a case in point, but I am sure if you took the time and trouble to look you would see that many everyday people also slip through the cracks but the case isn't a high profile case.

I think its called a police state. but lets at least be honest about it and not call it the land of the free

you would rather live somewhere else???? need help with the tickets?

to be honest america isnt #1 in any ranking of quality oflife issues. and i was born her doc so this is were my roots are my family my children etc etc but lets be honest here, there are many countries that have a better quality of life

name one that you think is better and would love to go live in, i'll buy your whole family tickets. dont cop out now.

for me it would be tahiti, but then again im a simple guy, grasshut on the beach, perfect.



the US has its fair share of problems not saying it doesnt, im just saying that its still the best place to be, the trade off for some of the other places are just not worth it, TO ME.

well that is your opinion but the facts are otherwise at least if you use the scientific method andI may add things are even worse than when the last global survey was done. I hardly think I will uproot my family doc but thanks for the offer but its not because I think america is the greatest its just were my life is. but I know we can do better being that we have alot of potential.

oh for sure! you and i agree again, we have the potential to do so much better than we are currently doing. absolutely, no arguemnent from me.

we just differ our opinions on how we should procede is all.

I still think Tahiti is the answer, hahaha!

Yeah, sad that we lead the world both in percentage and in total numbers incarcerated. You think it is bad now, let Hillary get elected and pass her health care and they start tossing you in jail for not having health insurance...or, as she said on meet the press "going after their wages". The we can all be in debtors prison...lol


it would be interesting to see the percentage incarcerated for "victimless" crimes, ie, personal drug usage, public intoxication, non-payment of taxes, child support, etc. I would expect the percentage of the incarcerated population would decrease by at least half if that number were released. For heck sakes, the town 5 miles away from me just passed a no smoking ordinance, Third offense carries a 60 day jail sentence. Now that is a terrible crime.(sarcasm)

I prefer Noway myself its ranked #1 in about every catagory that is measurable and with the global warming thing it may be the next tahiti

<~~~~~sending madman a ticket to Norway...via Beijing, of course, for a chance to see how the other systems work...j/k

now thats a gutsy call there mad man, some little pearls on Norway.

Norway has a high income tax rate and a moderate corporate tax rate. The top income tax rate is 47.8 percent, and the top corporate tax rate is 28 percent. Other taxes include a value-added tax (VAT) and a tax on net wealth. This VAT is 25% on all goods and services at each level of production or sale. In the most recent year, overall tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was 43.6 percent. 17% income tax for just medical care. $10 co pays to the Doctor, with waiting list for seeing a general practioner being several weeks in most parts of the country.

unemployment of 4.6% out of 4.6 million people.

Norway's economy is 69 percent free, according to our 2007 assessment, which makes it the world's 34th freest economy. Its overall score is 0.6 percentage point higher than last year, reflecting improvement in the investment climate and labor market flexibility. Norway is ranked 19th out of 41 countries in the European region, and its overall score is higher than the regional average.

Norway is considered to be a welfare state having over 23% of its citizens on government welfare programs.Over 50% of all immagrants to Norway are on welfare, 74% of those are on diabilty.

http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article1891543.ece is a link to norways newspaper the aftenposten. the article that is at the link is a general reporting of a recent poll given to norwegians about their tax situation....just one quote from the story......

Norwegians are among the most heavily taxed people in the world, and that in turn has made Norway one of the most expensive countries in which to live. Most accept the taxes they're ordered to pay on income and even net worth and property, but growing numbers are publicly complaining about sky-high taxes on everything from cars to fuel to consumer goods.


but hey you must have your reasons for liking it there.

well they could just be done away with

at the time of arrest

heard this actually happens in other countries

just a thought

but hey what do i know