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One of the counterarguments to this "hard on crime" line of thinking is the problem of mass incarceration. There is a limit to how many people can be imprisoned without compromising the system’s integrity. I learned more about this when I read about the Russian prison system, which developed its own set of rules after the communist revolution in 1917 and following literal imprisonment of whole nations in gulags. A similar phenomenon is happening in US prisons, where powerful gangs impose their own laws and influence both the inmates and the outsiders. Mass incarceration is a problem of the type that stares back if you stare at it intensely enough.
There is also a deeper problem behind this - whether we call it a “mental health crisis”, as some on the left do, or “social fabric being ripped apart”, as some on the right do. It is shocking that over 9% of males can expect to be imprisoned in their lifetime. Even if we are not among them, we cannot ignore the fact that 10% of males will experience the prison system for a period of time. Therefore, I do not think that the solution is to release violent criminals or to be extra tough on crime.
Wow, I would not have guessed. See source here, including racial breakdown: https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/Llgsfp.pdf
But, do note that the above is 1997 report using 1991 data. I believe rates are up since then, though, so I don't mean to disagree with your point.
Your data doesn't appear to include local jails, as ireally suggests below. However, rates are not up since 1991, which is at the top or end, depending on the particular stat, of the big crime peak - rates of homicide, property crime, etc have significantly decreased since then, even including the post 2020 spike
In what is my new favorite excuse, ChatGPT told me wrongly, my apologies. Checking Wikipedia (ironically, given how often we were told not to do that at first), per capita peaked in ~2008 (including local jails).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_incarceration_rate#Growth_and_Subsequent_Decline
Wikipedia is almost always a better source - in the sense of usefulness and accuracy of the information - than something like (not implying these are the same) nyt/cnn/nypost/local news, or even worse a popular random website, even if that random website is from "harvard" or something. It's a worse source than a paper / dataset / article in a trade publication / review article in the field, but those are hard to interpret if you're not familiar with them.
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I always have a hard time believing this. I suspect that this statistic includes -- and is vastly inflated by -- relatively short stints in county jails. If we look at the country's entire population and count everyone who, for example, spent a night in jail for a misdemeanor Fail To Appear warrant for driving on a suspended license and lump them together with the actual criminals in state and federal prisons, then I can see 9-10% being plausible. But actual prison incarceration? Doubt.
Lots of people have been jailed at one point in their life. Few have ever been imprisoned. Jail =/= prison. I think a lack of awareness of this distinction has led to the popularization of this statistic.
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