Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Think Debtors Prisons Are a Thing of the Past? Not in Mississippi

themarshallproject.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–138 of 138 posts

Re: Think Debtors Prisons Are a Thing of the Past? Not in Mississippi

#131

Post by Normal_gaussian »

FireBeyond wrote: post #125
Normal_gaussian wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. A punishment fails as a deterrent if: + it is not expected + it is not understood + it is not net negative The first, not expected, fits when; one believes their actions are legal and then they are found not to be (correctly or incorrectly); one expects a different punishment to the one given, and the expected punishment was not a deterrent (often seen in fraud cases). The second, not understood, fits when one ex…

I'd argue that you often only need one of those criteria. Witness Vinod Khosla and his battles: he has expected fines, understands them (though disagrees), and the net negative is (in his case) so trivial as to be negligible. "Oh, you want to fine me $10,000/day? Well, go for it. By the end of my life that might amount to 3% of my net worth".

That was in fact what I was attempting to convey. It was unfortunate that each point was formatted onto one line - I forgot that HN does not use markdown!

Re: Think Debtors Prisons Are a Thing of the Past? Not in Mississippi

#132

Post by csense »

Clubber wrote: post #108
ShroudedNight wrote: post #68

> The Mississippi Department of Corrections, or MDOC, repeatedly declined our requests to visit the restitution centers and to discuss them with state officials. But in a statement issued in late December in response to our findings, the department noted that it follows state law when operating the restitution program. If this program were one of integrity and justice, it should not have a problem exposing its comple…

Sadly, this happens in a lot of states. If you owe a fine and don't pay it because you can't, they'll keep tacking on interest until it reaches a certain limit, then throw you in jail. Our current state of government scares the hell out of me.

What's the alternative? Fines and jail are basically the legal system's two main options for punishment.

If a poor person commits a crime, that's not serious enough to throw them in jail, what should the legal system do?

It seems like "If you're poor, you can commit non-felony crimes without consequences" seems like a REAL bad policy idea.

Re: Think Debtors Prisons Are a Thing of the Past? Not in Mississippi

#133

Post by SamReidHughes »

wutbrodo wrote: post #90
rtpg wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are fined $20,000 for a thing and are unable to pay, you end up in a prison and are forced to work off your debt. This is functionally what debtors prisons were used for From the wiki summary: > Destitute persons who were unable to pay a court-ordered judgment would be incarcerated in these prisons until they had worked off their debt via labour or secured outside funds to pay the balance

Huh, TIL, for some reason I always thought they were for general debt.

YYDL, actually. They were for general debt.

Re: Think Debtors Prisons Are a Thing of the Past? Not in Mississippi

#134

Post by Clubber »

csense wrote: post #132
Clubber wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly, this happens in a lot of states. If you owe a fine and don't pay it because you can't, they'll keep tacking on interest until it reaches a certain limit, then throw you in jail. Our current state of government scares the hell out of me.

What's the alternative? Fines and jail are basically the legal system's two main options for punishment. If a poor person commits a crime, that's not serious enough to throw them in jail, what should the legal system do? It seems like "If you're poor, you can commit non-felony crimes without consequences" seems like a REAL bad policy idea.

Depends. If it's car related, revoke the license until the payment is made. Maybe do what the debt collectors do and harass them on the phone or garnish wages. Another thought, maybe we shouldn't make so many things crimes. We only do it to pay for the obscenely large justice and policing system. To me it just seems like a jobs program with a very steep societal cost.

I would think throwing someone in jail who owes money for a fine is very counter productive, considering how much it costs to incarcerate and jail someone. It's like spending $5000 to not collect a $500 debt. We aren't very good at government.

Re: Think Debtors Prisons Are a Thing of the Past? Not in Mississippi

#135

Post by rtpg »

wutbrodo wrote: post #90
rtpg wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are fined $20,000 for a thing and are unable to pay, you end up in a prison and are forced to work off your debt. This is functionally what debtors prisons were used for From the wiki summary: > Destitute persons who were unable to pay a court-ordered judgment would be incarcerated in these prisons until they had worked off their debt via labour or secured outside funds to pay the balance

Huh, TIL, for some reason I always thought they were for general debt.

This would actually happen. Usually the person you owe money to would drag you to court and then get you thrown in a debtors prison.

I guess my point was that you could end up there for civil or criminal things.

Re: Think Debtors Prisons Are a Thing of the Past? Not in Mississippi

#136

Post by ecoled_ame »

BubRoss wrote: post #118
ecoled_ame wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know, it’s one of the saddest aspects of existence in my opinion. I wish every child was planned for, had a job and housing lined up for them before birth. Instead we live in a random survival free-for-all. Sex is seen practically as a recreational activity, children as either unintentional accumulated byproducts or vague milestones of personal or economic achievement.

You can wish all you want, it doesn't change reality.

All changes start with a dream

Re: Think Debtors Prisons Are a Thing of the Past? Not in Mississippi

#137

Post by BubRoss »

ecoled_ame wrote: post #136
BubRoss wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can wish all you want, it doesn't change reality.

All changes start with a dream

Your dream is that people not have sex for fun and that poor people stop having children?

Re: Think Debtors Prisons Are a Thing of the Past? Not in Mississippi

#138

Post by Retric »

nine_k wrote: post #32
dfsgioninio wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The U.S. has the single highest incarceration rate in the world. In that respect, we have the worst criminal justice system in the world. Other metrics matter, of course, but let's not kid ourselves: the American system is an unmitigated disaster.

In some places, incarceration rates could be lower only because capital punishment is much more widely used. Not that US's incarceration rates are sane; to the contrary. I definitely think that incarceration is actively harmful at fighting crime, because it puts a criminal in an environment of worse criminals, and provides room and board to just hang with them and learn their rules by heart (or be abused, or killed b…

You can sanity check those assumptions. Worldwide executions are rare especially compared to US incarceration rates.

https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2019/04/death-penalty...

Post reply on HN