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At $75K, housing a prisoner in California now costs more than a year at Harvard

latimes.com

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Re: At $75K, housing a prisoner in California now costs more than a year at Harvard

#11

Post by trhway »

zensavona wrote: post #3

As much as I disagree with mass incarceration, I don't like these "it costs $nK to house a prisoner", since usually it's not quite true - costs are amortised over many thousands of prisoners and the state wouldn't actually regain $75k by releasing one prisoner. That being said, I am sure they would regain enough money to seriously help that person, which is more likely what they need than to be locked in a cage to ge…

> I don't like these "it costs $nK to house a prisoner", since usually it's not quite true - costs are amortised over many thousands of prisoners and the state wouldn't actually regain $75k by releasing one prisoner.

given the structure of the costs https://lao.ca.gov/policyareas/cj/6_cj_inmatecost there is not much amortization going on, at least not at the scale "over many thousands", more like "over tens and hundreds".

Re: At $75K, housing a prisoner in California now costs more than a year at Harvard

#12

Post by Sholmesy »

ujhmi6 wrote: post #10
nikhizzle wrote: post #8

To put this in perspective, the US has the highest incarceration rate of any country. I have trouble finding good numbers on recidivism, but anecdotally (based on sparse evidence) it seems like the US approach to incarceration is not working. Another fact supporting this is that the racial distribution in US prisons is uncorrelated with that of the general population. Specifically, 37% of inmates are African American…

What's wrong with the numbers of recidivism? A criminal is a criminal, he can't help it; I don't know why people think that keeping them locked up could ever fix that. Probably nothing can, maybe medication.

I don't think someone is born a criminal.

If that's the case, its cultural and can be influenced.

Re: At $75K, housing a prisoner in California now costs more than a year at Harvard

#13

Post by hobofan »

ujhmi6 wrote: post #10
nikhizzle wrote: post #8

To put this in perspective, the US has the highest incarceration rate of any country. I have trouble finding good numbers on recidivism, but anecdotally (based on sparse evidence) it seems like the US approach to incarceration is not working. Another fact supporting this is that the racial distribution in US prisons is uncorrelated with that of the general population. Specifically, 37% of inmates are African American…

What's wrong with the numbers of recidivism? A criminal is a criminal, he can't help it; I don't know why people think that keeping them locked up could ever fix that. Probably nothing can, maybe medication.

And the 2019 price for most reductionist view of other humans goes to...

Re: At $75K, housing a prisoner in California now costs more than a year at Harvard

#14

Post by mikejb »

nikhizzle wrote: post #8

To put this in perspective, the US has the highest incarceration rate of any country. I have trouble finding good numbers on recidivism, but anecdotally (based on sparse evidence) it seems like the US approach to incarceration is not working. Another fact supporting this is that the racial distribution in US prisons is uncorrelated with that of the general population. Specifically, 37% of inmates are African American…

I'd argue that the privatization of the prison system is a gigantic driver behind increased cost and recidivism. For the same reason as I don't trust dating-services: the product makes less money if it succeeds in it's original purpose. So there will always be the conflict of interest between having a product that works as advertised, and a product that makes more money.

Re: At $75K, housing a prisoner in California now costs more than a year at Harvard

#15

Post by geggam »

nikhizzle wrote: post #8

To put this in perspective, the US has the highest incarceration rate of any country. I have trouble finding good numbers on recidivism, but anecdotally (based on sparse evidence) it seems like the US approach to incarceration is not working. Another fact supporting this is that the racial distribution in US prisons is uncorrelated with that of the general population. Specifically, 37% of inmates are African American…

Overlay economic data on the race and the picture will change the story from racism to what I like to call "Being Poor is illegal in the US"

Re: At $75K, housing a prisoner in California now costs more than a year at Harvard

#17

Post by ujhmi6 »

Sholmesy wrote: post #12
ujhmi6 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's wrong with the numbers of recidivism? A criminal is a criminal, he can't help it; I don't know why people think that keeping them locked up could ever fix that. Probably nothing can, maybe medication.

I don't think someone is born a criminal. If that's the case, its cultural and can be influenced.

It might be environmental factors, I don't know, but certainly by the time someone ends up in prison it's already too late.

Re: At $75K, housing a prisoner in California now costs more than a year at Harvard

#18

Post by [deleted] »

namdnay wrote: post #9
nikhizzle wrote: post #8

To put this in perspective, the US has the highest incarceration rate of any country. I have trouble finding good numbers on recidivism, but anecdotally (based on sparse evidence) it seems like the US approach to incarceration is not working. Another fact supporting this is that the racial distribution in US prisons is uncorrelated with that of the general population. Specifically, 37% of inmates are African American…

I agree with most of your points, but I'm not sure about the validity of the following: > the racial distribution in US prisons is uncorrelated with that of the general population. Specifically, 37% of inmates are African American, suggesting they may be incarcerated for lesser cause than those of other backgrounds This statistic could suggest lots of things, I'm not sure why being incarcerated for lesser cause would…

[deleted]

Re: At $75K, housing a prisoner in California now costs more than a year at Harvard

#19

Post by isolli »

namdnay wrote: post #9
nikhizzle wrote: post #8

To put this in perspective, the US has the highest incarceration rate of any country. I have trouble finding good numbers on recidivism, but anecdotally (based on sparse evidence) it seems like the US approach to incarceration is not working. Another fact supporting this is that the racial distribution in US prisons is uncorrelated with that of the general population. Specifically, 37% of inmates are African American…

I agree with most of your points, but I'm not sure about the validity of the following: > the racial distribution in US prisons is uncorrelated with that of the general population. Specifically, 37% of inmates are African American, suggesting they may be incarcerated for lesser cause than those of other backgrounds This statistic could suggest lots of things, I'm not sure why being incarcerated for lesser cause would…

The charts in here [0] should alleviate any doubts you had: when it comes to marijuana possession, blacks are indeed arrested at massively higher rates.

[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/06/04/the-b...

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