Fun Fact #36: Over 1% of the US adult population is behind bars

It's pretty common knowledge that the prison system in the US leaves a lot to be desired. Harsher punishments and sentences mean that the current prison population is at an all time high. A new non-partisan study reports that more than one in 100 adults are behind bars. This new record high makes the US a clear front runner in prison population rates; China, with a far larger population, comes in second. States are spending about $50 billion a year on corrections.

The statistics regarding minorities are even more mind-boggling: "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". More than 10% of the young black male population is in prison.

The increased prison population could be attributed to a variety of things, there's no single dominating factor. But, as a future law student, one argument is particularly interesting. The amount of defendants who actually utilize a "true" trial has greatly diminished; most people are not tried in front of a jury of their peers (no matter what Law & Order would like you to believe). Many defendants choose to take the deals offered to them by judges (even if they are innocent) because they fear that turning down an offer would result in harsher sentencing if they're found guilty during a trial. Going to trial is risky; there's no guarantee regarding the outcome. Therefore, more defendants are probably going to prison (even for short amounts of time) than there would be if most defendants chose the trial route. And this could contribute to to the increased incarceration rate that we're now seeing.

The statistics I quoted would be somewhat acceptable if our correction system worked, but, fun fact, it doesn't work. A high percentage of people who come out of prisons just go right back in, it's a sad cycle. The violent and dangerous criminals should obliviously be incarcerated, but what about the non-violent offenders who make up almost half of the prison population? The article suggests that "less-expensive punishments such as community supervision, electronic monitoring and mandatory drug counseling might prove as much or more effective than jail".

I consider myself to be a moderate. I don't believe in letting all the non-violent offenders run free or anything like that because I realize "non-violent" may very well just mean "not caught doing anything violent". But something needs to change and I hope that our new president will be up to helping the states with that task. Spending billions of dollars to imprison someone, let them out, and imprison them again just doesn't seem like the best bet.