Brian Stewart on American prison nation

    Brian Stewart is a Fellow at the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto. Stewart has a long history as a senior reporter covering conflicts around the globe for about four decades now. In a recent CBC article he discusses the high rates of incarceration in the U.S. Finally, he notes that the Canadian government with a Conservative majority under Stephen Harper is following a similar path.
     Stewart calls the mass incarceration of millions of Americans one of the greatest scandals of our times. Yet little attention seems to be paid to it. The deficit and jobs are major domestic problems in the U.S. but the fact that the U.S. jails people at a rate seven times that of other developed nations seems neither here nor there.
     The U.S. with less than five per cent of the global population has 23 per cent of the prison population. At present 2,284,000 Americans are in prison with millions more under correctional supervision. Ron Paul with his campaign that would decriminalize recreational drug use is one of the few candidates to give even much thought to the problem.
     While Newt Gingrich has in the past advocated prison reform he has been notably silent on prison issues during debates. A common problem about even talking about reform for any politician is that they will depicted as soft on crime. Many fear this label could lose them support.
    In Canada the conservative government of Stephen Harper seems to be following in the U.S. path by building more prisons,  increasing penalties, and jailing more people. This is happening even as crime rates have been in decline. Some in the U.S. claim that declining crime rates there are a result of harsher penalties and more imprisonment. However as Stewart points out the declines are similar in both states with harsh criminal laws and those with less harsh laws.  In fact many studies suggest that crime rates depend much more on other factors than the severity of punishment whether harsh or relatively mild.
  Often rates of certain crimes can be altered by methods that have nothing to do with punishment. For example decriminalization of marijuana use and possession would eliminate one whole class of crimes. The Manitoba Public Insurance Co  has mandated anti-theft devices for many vehicles that have lowered the rate of auto theft substantially in Manitoba.The company pays for the devices since they save far more money than it costs to install the devices.  The devices make stealing the vehicle exceedingly difficult and this results in far fewer thefts For much more see the entire article here.
   

1 in 100 U.S. Adults behind bars

Even though the average yearly cost for retaining someone in jail is $23,000, it seems there is still lots of support for being being tough or even tougher on crime. The U.S. is now number one in incarcertang their citizens surpassing even Russia. The prison-industrial complex will probably not suffer from any recession.


1 in 100 U.S. Adults Behind Bars, New Study Says

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/28/us/28cnd-prison.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
By ADAM
LIPTAK
Published: February 28, 2008

For the first time in the nation's history, more than one in 100
American
adults is behind bars, according to a new report.

Nationwide, the prison population grew by 25,000 last year, bringing it
to
almost 1.6 million. Another 723,000 people are in local jails. The
number of
American adults is about 230 million, meaning that one in every 99.1
adults
is behind bars.

Incarceration rates are even higher for some groups. One in 36 Hispanic
adults is behind bars, based on Justice Department figures for 2006.
One in
15 black adults is, too, as is one in nine black men between the ages
of 20
and 34.

The report, from the Pew Center on the States, also found that only one
in
355 white women between the ages of 35 and 39 is behind bars, but that
one
in 100 black women is.

The report's methodology differed from that used by the Justice
Department,
which calculates the incarceration rate by using the total population
rather
than the adult population as the denominator. Using the department's
methodology, about one in 130 Americans is behind bars.

Either way, said Susan Urahn, the center's managing director, "we
aren't
really getting the return in public safety from this level of
incarceration."

"We tend to be a country in which incarceration is an easy response to
crime," Ms. Urahn continued. "Being tough on crime is an easy position
to
take, particularly if you have the money. And we did have the money in
the
'80s and '90s."

Now, with fewer resources available to the states, the report said,
"prison
costs are blowing a hole in state budgets." On average, states spend
almost
7 percent on their budgets on corrections, trailing only healthcare,
education and transportation.

In 2007, according to the National Association of State Budgeting
Officers,
states spent $44 billion in tax dollars on corrections. That is up from
$10.6 billion in 1987, a 127 increase once adjusted for inflation. With
money from bond issues and from the federal government included, total
state
spending on corrections last year was $49 billion. By 2011, the report
said,
states are on track to spend an additional $25 billion.

It cost an average of $23,876 to imprison someone in 2005, the most
recent
year for which data is available. But state spending varies widely,
from
$45,000 a year for each inmate in Rhode Island to just $13,000 in
Louisiana.

The cost of medical care is growing by 10 percent annually, the report
said,
a rate that will accelerate as the prison population ages.

About one in nine state government employees works in corrections, and
some
states are finding it hard to fill those jobs. California spent more
than
$500 million on overtime alone in 2006.

The number of prisoners in California dropped by 4,000 last year,
making
Texas's prison system the nation's largest, at about 172,000 inmates.
But
the Texas legislature approved broad changes to the state's corrections
system, including expansions of drug treatment programs and drug courts
and
revisions to parole practices.

"Our violent offenders, we lock them up for a very long time —
rapists,
murderers, child molestors," said John Whitmire, a Democratic state
senator
from Houston and the chairman of the state senate's criminal justice
committee. "The problem was that we weren't smart about nonviolent
offenders. The legislature finally caught up with the public."

He gave an example.

"We have 5,500 D.W.I offenders in prison," he said, including people
caught
driving under the influence who had not been in an accident. "They're
in the
general population. As serious as drinking and driving is, we should
segregate them and give them treatment."

The Pew report recommended diverting nonviolent offenders away from
prison
and using punishments short of reincarceration for minor or technical
violations of probation or parole. It also urged states to consider
earlier
release of some prisoners.

Before the recent changes in Texas, Mr. Whitmire said, "we were
recycling
nonviolent offenders."