JLF: Our Prison System is a Mess
Johnny Lead Foot here, and I'm pissed...
The Pew Center released a report a few days ago about the U.S. prison system called One in 100: Behind Bars in America 2008. The findings are.... insane. They have me FULL HAWT. Ready?
1 in 99.1 adult Americans is in jail. 2,319,258 people. 1 in 30 males from ages 20 and 34 is behind bars. For blacks, the rate for that age group is 1 in 9. Age group 35-39: 1 in 355 white women are incarcerated and 1 in 100 black women are.
2,319,258 adults in jail. The runner-up is China with 1.5 million. But with their population soaring over 1 billion adults, their percentage of incarcerated adults is under 0.15%. The U.S.'s is 1.0%.
We aren't talking about a stretch of time here, either. We aren't talking
about the number of people incarcerated over a month or a year. This is
a snapshot. At the beginning of 2008. A snapshot. Holy moly.
What the HECK is going on? We lead the world in number of incarcerated people. We lead the world in percentage of population in jail. We lead the world for inmates per capita (750 out of 100,000) with Russia second (628 per 100,000). The United States has 5% of the world's population and 25% of the world's incarcerated population.
The cost is insane, too. The Pew Center's report said the U.S.'s states spent over $49 billion on corrections last year. 20 years ago, it was $11 billion. In fact, collectively, correctional agencies take up 6.8% of the state general funds. That's 1 in every 15 dollars!
What goes into this cost? Well, prisons are 24/7 operation and they require highly trained staff. As a result, 13 states are now funneling over $1 billion annually to their corrections systems. Thirteen! California leads the pack, with an $8.8 billion price tag, spending over $2 billion just on health insurance costs for inmates. In fact, health insurance is an (alarmingly) growing cost for every state. Prison is not only a hotbed for communicable diseases, but it has an aging population as well. From 1992 to 2001, inmates over 50 years old (both federal and state) grew from 41 to 113 thousand. That's an increase of 173%. The older population has significantly larger health demands, averaging $70 thousand a year in financial support, two to three times that of younger prisoners.
Another key cost in that $49 billion is overtime salaries. There are about four hundred seventy thousand employees in corrections, but those still aren't enough. Staffing is a challenge. Given the current employee pool, overtime is a necessity. Overtime in Wisconsin rose 27% between 2006 and 2007 due to an increase of 1,200 inmates. Overtime, alone, cost California over half a billion dollars in 2006. Six employees even made more than the $212,179 set aside by the Governator.
It's important to note that states have fixed budgets. (Unlike the federal government, they can't just make money or issue bonds.) Also, lots of states' initiatives receive federal funding--like education or transportation--but the federal government doesn't find incarceration. So, for every dollar a state spends on a prison is a dollar less for other initiatives. To study how the money-sink-that-is-the-prison-system affects other policies, the report compares prison spend versus spend on higher education over the last 20 years. Clearly, one would hope increase in education spend would exceed that of the prison system.... but you know the truth is the other way around. In fact, it's quite extreme. The ratio of increased prison spend to higher education spend was 6 to 1 from 1987 to now. 127% to 21%. 6 to 1!
There seems to be no end in sight. In fact, according to the Pew report, costs are expected to be $74 billion, up $25 from now, by 2011. $74 billion! California's so desperate, Schwarzenegger has proposed releasing over twenty-two thousand inmates--mainly nonviolent, nonserious offenders--to save $1.1 billion. The state didn't take the proposal well, but it goes to show how desperate the situation has become.
The financial impact just isn't in the cost to keep inmates, though. If a prisoner works, he makes a very low salary, not enough to pay child support. In fact, three out of every five federal prisoners have children, and their sentences average 10 years. Current nation-wide data is scarce, but a 2001 study in Massachusetts found that three quarters of their inmates were not paying child support. I mean, forget child support, there are well over a million parents in jail. A MILLION.
A bit of a mess, eh? What the heck is going on? Why is this happening? My guess? The political system. Why? Because a political candidate just can't run on a "soft-on-crime" platform. The tougher the better. And the only measure of effectiveness, for America, has been tough sentences. Let's take Kentucky. Governor Steve Beshear is quite cocky about his control on crime, saying the rate of crime only increased 3% in the past 30 years, yet the state's inmate population has increased 600% in that time. Last year, Kentucky's inmate increase was 12%.
But popular opinion is changing. Crime has dropped from the top of the list of voters' concerns. Couple that with politicians who have their hands tied by growing prison costs, and everyone seems to want to explore new approaches. Finally. Clearly what we have now isn't working. Clearly.
In an effort to highlight effective alternative policy, the Pew study summarizes what's happening in Texas. Between 1995 and 2005, Texas's prison population jumped 300%. They invested $2.3 billion to add 108,000 beds, and they are already need more space. Desperate, in 2007, they started trying something new. Instead of putting $523 million more in prison cells, they expanded drug treatment for prisoners. There have also been considerable changes to parole practices and expanded drug courts. The result? Texas is expected to save $210 million over the next two years. Incarceration rates are expected to plateau for the next 5 years.
Focusing on drug treatment is a possible solution. See, there is a strong bias against drug infractions in the penal system. There are sentencing minimums that Congress put into effect in 1986 (and tightened in 1988) in an effort to be tough on crime. The sentencing could be boiled down to two tiers of penalty. The lower will get you a 5-year minimum. The higher will get you10 years, minimum.
The laws provide no leniency on sentencing. They were designed to guarantee major drug players would be put away for a significant amount of time. But Congress, in its drive to be "Tough on Drugs" set the possession amounts low enough that small-players (pawns in the system) trigger the minimum sentence. For example, the amount of crack that would give someone five years in prison is..... 5 grams. That isn't an amount a kingpin would be dealing in. In 1995, the U.S. Sentincing Commission released a study that only 11% of the drug offenders in jail were major dealers. 11%!!!! The most insane part of it, though, is that these minimums applied to everyone, even first time offenders.
Another key issue with minimum sentences is that sentencing control is removed from impartial judges and placed in the hands of biased prosecutors who need the largest sentence possible to further their careers. With the minimums, the prosecutors have the power to determine the charge, and judges have no latitude to bend the rules for special cases. Insanity.
In 1991, the U.S. Sentencing Commission, an independent agency of the Judicial Branch of the US Government, expressed concern with the ineffectiveness of the laws. In 1994, they got President Bill Clinton's attention, along with Congress's. The law-makers' response, though, was minimal: passing soft laws that allowed a bit of leniency for non-violent, first time offenders.
Of all of the drugs monitored by the minimum sentencing laws, crack cocaine's regulations are totally out of proportion to other drugs'. Apparently, crack cocaine has a 100 times more stringent legislation than powder cocaine. That's enough to get me full HAWT. It even has Bill Clinton full HAWT (and fully remorseful). Just last week, he expressed regret about his and congress's decision to keep the minimums in place. In his keynote address to the University of Pennsylvania, Clinton admitted to believing that crack cocaine minimums had almost destroyed some black communities. "I regret more than I can say that we didn't do more on it. I'm prepared to spend a significant portion of whatever life I've got left on the earth trying to fix this because I think it's a cancer."
Just how many prisoners are in for drugs, though? Let's look at Maryland where 23,342 people are incarcerated. The Pew Report says that 70% of them are there for drug or drug-related offenses. That is monumental. If more states put more resources towards treatment, like Texas, we might change this whole thing. Change this country.
There is a sliver of good news, though. The U.S. Sentencing Commission has continued its efforts. November 1st, 2007, they voted 7-0 to amend the sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine prosecution that addressed the 100 to 1 difference in sentencing between crack and powder cocaines. Congress did not oppose the suggestion, and so, March 3rd, 2008, new laws were put into place. Also, they are retroactive. As many as 19,500 inmates will be able to apply for sentence reductions (that should average around 2 years). There is some progress!
And so it goes. We sit here, the champs of incarcerating our own people, mainly for drug offenses. It's putting a strain on our governments' fiscal responsibilities. It's handicapping societies where amazing demographics are behind bars, without access to jobs or their children. We sit here, at a turning point, where we can truly assess how we should tackle our problems.
Always your pleasure.
- JLF
Find me on Facebook.com, and join the HAWTaction.com Reader group. My name there is Johnny LeadFoot (they didn't allow the space).
The cost is insane, too. The Pew Center's report said the U.S.'s states spent over $49 billion on corrections last year. 20 years ago, it was $11 billion. In fact, collectively, correctional agencies take up 6.8% of the state general funds. That's 1 in every 15 dollars!
What goes into this cost? Well, prisons are 24/7 operation and they require highly trained staff. As a result, 13 states are now funneling over $1 billion annually to their corrections systems. Thirteen! California leads the pack, with an $8.8 billion price tag, spending over $2 billion just on health insurance costs for inmates. In fact, health insurance is an (alarmingly) growing cost for every state. Prison is not only a hotbed for communicable diseases, but it has an aging population as well. From 1992 to 2001, inmates over 50 years old (both federal and state) grew from 41 to 113 thousand. That's an increase of 173%. The older population has significantly larger health demands, averaging $70 thousand a year in financial support, two to three times that of younger prisoners.
Another key cost in that $49 billion is overtime salaries. There are about four hundred seventy thousand employees in corrections, but those still aren't enough. Staffing is a challenge. Given the current employee pool, overtime is a necessity. Overtime in Wisconsin rose 27% between 2006 and 2007 due to an increase of 1,200 inmates. Overtime, alone, cost California over half a billion dollars in 2006. Six employees even made more than the $212,179 set aside by the Governator.
It's important to note that states have fixed budgets. (Unlike the federal government, they can't just make money or issue bonds.) Also, lots of states' initiatives receive federal funding--like education or transportation--but the federal government doesn't find incarceration. So, for every dollar a state spends on a prison is a dollar less for other initiatives. To study how the money-sink-that-is-the-prison-system affects other policies, the report compares prison spend versus spend on higher education over the last 20 years. Clearly, one would hope increase in education spend would exceed that of the prison system.... but you know the truth is the other way around. In fact, it's quite extreme. The ratio of increased prison spend to higher education spend was 6 to 1 from 1987 to now. 127% to 21%. 6 to 1!
There seems to be no end in sight. In fact, according to the Pew report, costs are expected to be $74 billion, up $25 from now, by 2011. $74 billion! California's so desperate, Schwarzenegger has proposed releasing over twenty-two thousand inmates--mainly nonviolent, nonserious offenders--to save $1.1 billion. The state didn't take the proposal well, but it goes to show how desperate the situation has become.
The financial impact just isn't in the cost to keep inmates, though. If a prisoner works, he makes a very low salary, not enough to pay child support. In fact, three out of every five federal prisoners have children, and their sentences average 10 years. Current nation-wide data is scarce, but a 2001 study in Massachusetts found that three quarters of their inmates were not paying child support. I mean, forget child support, there are well over a million parents in jail. A MILLION.
A bit of a mess, eh? What the heck is going on? Why is this happening? My guess? The political system. Why? Because a political candidate just can't run on a "soft-on-crime" platform. The tougher the better. And the only measure of effectiveness, for America, has been tough sentences. Let's take Kentucky. Governor Steve Beshear is quite cocky about his control on crime, saying the rate of crime only increased 3% in the past 30 years, yet the state's inmate population has increased 600% in that time. Last year, Kentucky's inmate increase was 12%.
But popular opinion is changing. Crime has dropped from the top of the list of voters' concerns. Couple that with politicians who have their hands tied by growing prison costs, and everyone seems to want to explore new approaches. Finally. Clearly what we have now isn't working. Clearly.
In an effort to highlight effective alternative policy, the Pew study summarizes what's happening in Texas. Between 1995 and 2005, Texas's prison population jumped 300%. They invested $2.3 billion to add 108,000 beds, and they are already need more space. Desperate, in 2007, they started trying something new. Instead of putting $523 million more in prison cells, they expanded drug treatment for prisoners. There have also been considerable changes to parole practices and expanded drug courts. The result? Texas is expected to save $210 million over the next two years. Incarceration rates are expected to plateau for the next 5 years.
Focusing on drug treatment is a possible solution. See, there is a strong bias against drug infractions in the penal system. There are sentencing minimums that Congress put into effect in 1986 (and tightened in 1988) in an effort to be tough on crime. The sentencing could be boiled down to two tiers of penalty. The lower will get you a 5-year minimum. The higher will get you10 years, minimum.
The laws provide no leniency on sentencing. They were designed to guarantee major drug players would be put away for a significant amount of time. But Congress, in its drive to be "Tough on Drugs" set the possession amounts low enough that small-players (pawns in the system) trigger the minimum sentence. For example, the amount of crack that would give someone five years in prison is..... 5 grams. That isn't an amount a kingpin would be dealing in. In 1995, the U.S. Sentincing Commission released a study that only 11% of the drug offenders in jail were major dealers. 11%!!!! The most insane part of it, though, is that these minimums applied to everyone, even first time offenders.
Another key issue with minimum sentences is that sentencing control is removed from impartial judges and placed in the hands of biased prosecutors who need the largest sentence possible to further their careers. With the minimums, the prosecutors have the power to determine the charge, and judges have no latitude to bend the rules for special cases. Insanity.
In 1991, the U.S. Sentencing Commission, an independent agency of the Judicial Branch of the US Government, expressed concern with the ineffectiveness of the laws. In 1994, they got President Bill Clinton's attention, along with Congress's. The law-makers' response, though, was minimal: passing soft laws that allowed a bit of leniency for non-violent, first time offenders.
Of all of the drugs monitored by the minimum sentencing laws, crack cocaine's regulations are totally out of proportion to other drugs'. Apparently, crack cocaine has a 100 times more stringent legislation than powder cocaine. That's enough to get me full HAWT. It even has Bill Clinton full HAWT (and fully remorseful). Just last week, he expressed regret about his and congress's decision to keep the minimums in place. In his keynote address to the University of Pennsylvania, Clinton admitted to believing that crack cocaine minimums had almost destroyed some black communities. "I regret more than I can say that we didn't do more on it. I'm prepared to spend a significant portion of whatever life I've got left on the earth trying to fix this because I think it's a cancer."
Just how many prisoners are in for drugs, though? Let's look at Maryland where 23,342 people are incarcerated. The Pew Report says that 70% of them are there for drug or drug-related offenses. That is monumental. If more states put more resources towards treatment, like Texas, we might change this whole thing. Change this country.
There is a sliver of good news, though. The U.S. Sentencing Commission has continued its efforts. November 1st, 2007, they voted 7-0 to amend the sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine prosecution that addressed the 100 to 1 difference in sentencing between crack and powder cocaines. Congress did not oppose the suggestion, and so, March 3rd, 2008, new laws were put into place. Also, they are retroactive. As many as 19,500 inmates will be able to apply for sentence reductions (that should average around 2 years). There is some progress!
And so it goes. We sit here, the champs of incarcerating our own people, mainly for drug offenses. It's putting a strain on our governments' fiscal responsibilities. It's handicapping societies where amazing demographics are behind bars, without access to jobs or their children. We sit here, at a turning point, where we can truly assess how we should tackle our problems.
Always your pleasure.
- JLF
Find me on Facebook.com, and join the HAWTaction.com Reader group. My name there is Johnny LeadFoot (they didn't allow the space).
Great post, Johnny. "U.S.A #1!" Looks like we can chant that over and over again while reading this one...
failed drug war and growing prison industry. search and seizure is a source of income for law enforcement agencies, so they also push for tough drug sentences.
i highly recommend the documentary Prison Town, USA for a realistic look at how the growing prison industry has negatively affected rural american communities.
Great reference, ferny. Even reading the synopsis gave me the chills. I'll scan PBS for this one.
Got to love the Republicans, Ronald and Nancy Reagan.
Wasn't it Nancy who pushed the war on drugs and the three strikes rule?
I guess it comes down to a simple choice really... Get busy living or get busy dying.
Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.
I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don't want to know. Some things are better left unsaid. I'd like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can't be expressed in words, and it makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a grey place dares to dream. It was as if some beautiful bird had flapped into our drab little cage and made these walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free.
Hey JLF,
Try examining the relationships of crack cocaine mandatory minimums compared with powder cocaine mandatory minimums and ask yourself if there are racial and socioeconomic implications with the sentences. Wall Street guys get off easy. This white 27 year old dude was caught with 50 grams of powder and is now living at home with his parents with a curfew. If 5 grams of rock get you 5 years in jail, this kid should be doing time. Coincidence?
See http://www.drugpolicy.org/library/factsheets/raceandthedr/crack_cocaine.cfm