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NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

theintercept.com

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Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#241

Post by Eddy_Viscosity2 »

ok_dad wrote: post #233
Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to federal data the average annual cost per prisoner in federal prisons is about $115,000. Thought experiment: Imagine that instead of that, we identified people likely to become criminals, using all that new fangled crime prediction AI that police forces are so excited about. Then just given them say half that amount as UBI, so $50,000/year and say you can have this as long as you don't do crime. Peoples l…

Better yet, just give everybody a UBI sufficient for the basics, then we don't need to spend money on any newfangled AI bullshit.

newfangled AI bullshit is a key component of the pitch. If you say you just want to help people and make the world better, there will be zero traction. But, say you have newfangled AI bullshit and now everybody is talking about it and trying to invest in newfangled AI bullshit companies and those companies then use that money on lobbyists who then 'contribute' to politicians who then pass the bills. It's not the world I want, but its the one we got.

Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#242

Post by squokko »

mabbo wrote: post #81

I feel like the prison system is the victim of perverse incentives. The goal given to them is "house this person securely for a specific length of time at the lowest cost possible ". They are rewarded for cutting costs. But the total cost we pay is the cost to imprison this person the second and third time when they re-offend. It's the policing costs when they're homeless because they can't find housing or get a job.…

Prison creates absolute animals. We shouldn't put people in prison unless they're going to be there for their entire lives. Singapore-style caning is probably much better for both the convict and the broader society -- take the incorrigible violent criminals and lock them up for life without parole, and cane the rest.

Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#243

Post by plorg »

KMag wrote: post #201
mabbo wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Specifically, the concept I'm referring to is Predestination[0], or the more extreme version 'Double predestination', wherein God pre-ordained who the Good people are and who the Bad people are, and you know you're the Good people because bad things aren't happening to you, and you know that that person must be a Bad person because bad things happen to them. If you're born to a wealthy privileged life, this belief sa…

Again, I'm not a theologian, but this sounds like some mixture of predestination and prosperity gospel, not merely predestination. Most of Jesus's most influential early followers were hunted down and tortured by the Roman authorities, which wouldn't seem to jive with the proposed criteria.

This reads like you are suggesting that Calvinism is the same as early Christianity. There was no single organized Christian belief to speak of, and very likely what organization there was looked nothing like the church of 16th century Geneva let alone that of 18th to 21st century America.

Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#244

Post by notch656c »

thebooktocome wrote: post #238
notch656c wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a politer society with more reasonable laws using a gun to take someone's money would have exactly one outcome: a 9mm hole in that robber's head. Anything beyond that is charity.

“Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement.”

Someone tried to rob me at gunpoint many years ago. Pointed a gun to my head when I got a flat tire innocently trying to bike home from a bad part of town. Why was I in a bad part of town? Working in a hospital with the people helping the people in a bad part of town.

I didn't try to kill them, even though I managed to fight the upper hand off of them. When the scuffle ended all I said was "don't point things at my head."

Choose to believe me or not. Don't make presumptions about eagerness.

Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#245

Post by Eddy_Viscosity2 »

concordDance wrote: post #239
ok_dad wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better yet, just give everybody a UBI sufficient for the basics, then we don't need to spend money on any newfangled AI bullshit.

This has the effect of discouraging people from working. So the question becomes how many are left who would be willing to work? And would we need a 80% tax rate on all transactions between people to fund it? And would that be a really bad idea?

You only get the money if you are likely to be a criminal. Since it is based on 'AI', that would mean people from poor and crime prone areas because pattern-matching. So you weren't already in that situation, then you'd have to figure out how to make your family very poor and move to a poor crime prone area. That's alot of friction for most to bother with. If everyone in that area qualifies and get the money, over time it likely that crime would decrease and economic activity would increase, school funding improves, and so on and so and eventually this place will no longer be seen by the AI to produce criminals.

Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#246

Post by vagrantJin »

TAKEMYMONEY wrote: post #175
vagrantJin wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pimps are not neccesarily traffickers. It might be hard to digest but a large majority of people in the industry go in by choice. We should have tougher law enforcement to weed out the bad apples, but that is difficult since this isssue seems to involve two things that are extremely nebulous and difficult to weigh. Sex and morality.

> "Pimps are not neccesarily [sic] traffickers" Right, they just use force, fraud, and coercion as they recruit, transport, and provide their victims as prostitutes. Totally different... > "a large majority of people in the industry go in by choice" Cool, can you share your stats that a "large proportion" of people go in by choice?

Interesting that you want stats. In the interest of science - would you be willing to talk to actual prostitutes from down the street to those on social media and platforms like only fans - to collect the data yourself. Thats within your means to do is it not?

If you are genuinely interested in the well being of prostitutes that is.

> Right, they just use force, fraud, and coercion as they recruit, transport, and provide their victims as prostitutes. Totally different...

It is different.

My point is trafficking is bigger than prostitution.

Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#247

Post by georgyo »

Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote: post #230
mabbo wrote: post #81

I feel like the prison system is the victim of perverse incentives. The goal given to them is "house this person securely for a specific length of time at the lowest cost possible ". They are rewarded for cutting costs. But the total cost we pay is the cost to imprison this person the second and third time when they re-offend. It's the policing costs when they're homeless because they can't find housing or get a job.…

According to federal data the average annual cost per prisoner in federal prisons is about $115,000. Thought experiment: Imagine that instead of that, we identified people likely to become criminals, using all that new fangled crime prediction AI that police forces are so excited about. Then just given them say half that amount as UBI, so $50,000/year and say you can have this as long as you don't do crime. Peoples l…

My first gut reaction was $115k/person/year was way too high... But apparently a person in a NYC prison costs $560k/year[1]...That amount of money can definitely do a lot of good to rehabilitate a person.

However

> we identified people likely to become criminals

This tricky, because people will think it is GOOD to marked by the algorithm; key free money! Then these algorithm will likely be used in court as evidence that a person likely commit a crime. Sadly, this is already happening today [2]

> you can have this as long as you don't do crime.

So if you are convicted of a crime, in addition to all the stuff convictions currently do to prevent you from getting a job and beating any chance to better yourself besides crime, you also loose that UBI making you even MORE desperate than you were before. All you have done is increase the longer term punishment of prision.

Not to mention it encourages first time convictions so the city can save money. There are many vindictive judges, who will say something like "You don't deserve the money the goverment is giving you."

[1] https://comptroller.nyc.gov/newsroom/comptroller-stringer-co...

[2] https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/secret-algorith...

Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#248

Post by Tangurena2 »

mabbo wrote: post #81

I feel like the prison system is the victim of perverse incentives. The goal given to them is "house this person securely for a specific length of time at the lowest cost possible ". They are rewarded for cutting costs. But the total cost we pay is the cost to imprison this person the second and third time when they re-offend. It's the policing costs when they're homeless because they can't find housing or get a job.…

One essay that touches briefly on this is Million Dollar Murray [0], about a homeless man and how the unwillingness of society to deal with his homelessness cost the taxpayers of Reno more than a million dollars. One of the points in the essay was that many difficult problems had "power law" distributions [1] (where the action is all at one extreme).

And one successful program for treating homelessness handed out keys to apartments. The "moral hazard" involved offends lots of people: "I pay my rent! Why should some one/freeloader/whatever get a free place to live when I have to pay?" Outrage seems to be the driving force in media these days. Which is why nothing will change.

0 - https://housingmatterssc.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Mill...

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_law

Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#249

Post by [deleted] »

vibrio_bobtail wrote: post #196
hnlmorg wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The GP wasn’t trying to make light of his brother-in-laws crime (if he was, he wouldn’t have said what the conviction was). His point was that his brother-in-law has been exploited while serving his time and that is what leads to a high number of reoffenders. For what it’s worth, I agree with his point. The west looks down on revenge ruling, “an eye for an eye” etc. Yet the US prison system isn’t any more evolved. Th…

> The GP wasn’t trying to make light of his brother-in-laws crime (if he was, he wouldn’t have said what the conviction was). He was making doing exactly that when he said no one was injured. Just because someone wasn't physically injured doesn't mean they weren't profoundly harmed by being a victim or armed robbery. How long did it take that victim to feel safe in their community again? His brother-in-law took that…

[deleted]

Re: NYC jails want to ban physical mail, then privatize scanning of digital versions

#250

Post by thebooktocome »

notch656c wrote: post #244
thebooktocome wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement.”

Someone tried to rob me at gunpoint many years ago. Pointed a gun to my head when I got a flat tire innocently trying to bike home from a bad part of town. Why was I in a bad part of town? Working in a hospital with the people helping the people in a bad part of town. I didn't try to kill them, even though I managed to fight the upper hand off of them. When the scuffle ended all I said was "don't point things at my h…

I’m supposed to take comfort in the fact that you’re more violent in hypothetical situations?

The death penalty will always be executed with a certain false positive rate. Willing it as a form of punishment necessarily entails willing the death of innocent people, who crucially can’t be brought back in the event that the state realizes it was mistaken.

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