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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

#291

Post by lukeschlather »

rtpg wrote: post #270
foobarian wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel the difference is that Norway is far more homogeneous and the intent to rehabilitate is sincere. On the other hand I feel like a lot of the criminal justice system in the USA is segregationist under the covers. When you look at it this way then it's working as desired.

Why do you think the intention to rehabilitate in the US isn’t sincere? Frontline did a report on people on parole. It’s a punishing system, even when you’re out of the systems you’re usually one drink away from being thrown back in It’s a very good example of something where all the individual players are trying, but so much of how the system works makes results be harsh and cruel

Much of the system (including punishing probation) is designed to give racists a lot of discretion to oppress ethnic groups they dislike. Intention of rank-and-file may be to rehabilitate, but that doesn't matter if the intention of the lawmakers and higher-ups is to keep certain ethnic groups in jail (while maintaining a pretense of impartiality.)

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

#292

Post by eropple »

ewzimm wrote: post #273
darepublic wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if rehabilitation is so effective maybe we can 'rehabilitate' people before they end up in prison in the first place :p. How do people end up deprived of education and counselling in the first place, and could that be remedied.

In many cases, the idea of rehabilitating people either before or after prison is nearly impossible. There are almost half a million people in the American prison system for drug offenses. If someone is released from prison for cannabis possession, they can likely drive a few hours to a place where it's perfectly legal (at the state level), and even encouraged by the culture. How could you possibly rehabilitate someo…

This is a strange reply. What makes you think that that is what the poster to whom you reply is concerned about?

People don't commit violent crimes for weed. The crime is having weed. And things that are not weed are not being legalized state-by-state.

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

#293

Post by dalbasal »

mch82 wrote: post #269
kybernetikos wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do find it interesting that probably many of these people would not commit crime if they were paid $50k per year to not commit crime (which would save money!). Unfortunately you could never do this as an actual policy because of the incentives, it's just interesting that they end up forcing us to spend so much money so unproductively. I absolutely believe that there is room for something innovative to be done here,…

Interesting observation. Can you elaborate on the “could neve do this because of incentives” caveat?

If a court ordered that a convicted criminal get money for not committing crimes, the OP suggests that this would work better and cheaper than prison. The incentive problem is that people would commit crimes in order to get this deal.

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

#294

Post by smileysteve »

AshishBora wrote: post #56
andy_ppp wrote: post #26

Might as well just give people the money as long as they don't re-offend?

Bad idea. This gives an incentive to start committing crimes to get free money for life.

The re-offend part might matter. You're on probation, and as long as you're only on probation, you get dividends from the government.

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

#295

Post by Mc_Big_G »

dalbasal wrote: post #126

I think it's worth thinking about the history of incarceration, for context. Until fairly recently, prison wasn't really the way most punishments worked. They did hangings, beatings, shaming, banishment... Imprisoning people long term is expensive, and kings probably couldn't have afforded anything like a modern scale prison system. The closest thing was more slavery than imprisonment, and economically self-sufficien…

Are you suggesting we've actually TRIED rehabilitation? If so, I think our definitions differ. We haven't tried anything besides incarceration.

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

#296

Post by leetcrew »

conanbatt wrote: post #266
leetcrew wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

most people rightly oppose slavery. but confining people to cages for years at a time is pretty bad too. if it's possible to justify imprisonment in the first place, are all forms of forced labor significantly worse? what if the prisoners get training as webdevs and have to spend 6-8 hours on weekdays improving the UI of government websites. they get an aeron chair, free coffee, ping pong, etc., and when they get rel…

The thing is that then the warden sells of the inmates to make money on himself or through the state. California paid inmates fighting fires a dollar an hour.

this is a non sequitur to my post. I asked a pretty specific question that you have not answered in your reply.

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

#297

Post by lexs »

ujhmi6 wrote: post #38
izietto wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a very bigot reasoning. The most civilized countries in the world (Scandinavia) tend towards the opposite: - shorter incarceration period: incarceration is useful just for frustrated masses, not for the society - rehabilitation: if incarceration period is useful to something, that is giving people time and space to restart their lives

Scandinavia is a bad example; that only works when you have a culturally and racially homogeneous society.

Do you really think that urban hipsters from Stockholm are culturally similar to rural Swedes? This sounds more like a dog whistle for "non-white". In any case it is a deeply racist view.

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

#298

Post by smileysteve »

narrator wrote: post #81

The 5 Highest-Paid California State Employees All Work in the Prison System, Make Over $500,000 Per Year https://www.laweekly.com/news/the-5-highest-paid-california-...

$500k seems like a low cutoff for a team managing 8,763 locations, 66k employees, 136,000 inmates. If we're comparing to the private sector.

And if we keep the relation to Harvard, I'm quite sure there are more than 5 staff at harvard making over 500k/year.

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

#299

Post by CalRobert »

charlesbradshaw wrote: post #281
foobarian wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel the difference is that Norway is far more homogeneous and the intent to rehabilitate is sincere. On the other hand I feel like a lot of the criminal justice system in the USA is segregationist under the covers. When you look at it this way then it's working as desired.

What does homogeneous have to do with prison rehabilitation? I'm not attacking you, genuinely curious.

If I think "that guy/girl in prison could be my neighbour, cousin, god help me even my kid" I will care about them and want them to be rehabilitated. They're a relatable person to me.

If I think "it's one of those people from the other side of the tracks" it won't feel like a person with whom I could have a close connection. I might not care as much.

Not saying it's a good thing, though.

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

#300

Post by ghomrassen »

lukeschlather wrote: post #291
rtpg wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think the intention to rehabilitate in the US isn’t sincere? Frontline did a report on people on parole. It’s a punishing system, even when you’re out of the systems you’re usually one drink away from being thrown back in It’s a very good example of something where all the individual players are trying, but so much of how the system works makes results be harsh and cruel

Much of the system (including punishing probation) is designed to give racists a lot of discretion to oppress ethnic groups they dislike. Intention of rank-and-file may be to rehabilitate, but that doesn't matter if the intention of the lawmakers and higher-ups is to keep certain ethnic groups in jail (while maintaining a pretense of impartiality.)

What racists?
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