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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

#71

Post by anilakar »

fxj wrote: post #60
throwaway13337 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. None of the things you listed are anywhere near a free market in the US. You've created a compelling argument against government intervention, actually. 2. I agree with the second point. The US government officially does, too. Prison should be about rehabilitation and not retribution. It's just that the government doesn't act like it agrees.

If this is a compelling argument against gouvernment intervention, then why does it work so much better in europe where all three sectors are state-owned? The best example is switzerland, where the costs are a fraction of the costs in the U.S ( and which is not a "socialist" country at all).

[flagged]

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

#73

Post by freyir »

isolli wrote: post #22
geggam wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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"

Not quite: have a look at these charts [0]. I believe that such a massive disparity in arrest rates between blacks and whites cannot be explained just by economic factors. [0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/06/04/the-b...

Marijuana arrests account for 0.7% of the prison population.

It would be interesting to see the figures for other types of arrest.

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

#75

Post by SeanDav »

CraigJPerry wrote: post #65
fxj wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the problem is that all three sectors that you cite, health care, higher education and prison system, there is no free market but they are oligopols where only a small number of big players can lever their weight and keep others out.

Is that not just a "no true Scotsman" argument? "there is no free market but they are oligopols" There used to be 12 private prison companies in 2000 but it appears there are only 3 now. The start of the journey was privatization of prisons. This is where that path has currently led. It is what it is, ergo free market didn't work?

Even in free markets, Oligarchies and Monopolies are a thing. No system is perfect - potential lack of competition in niche areas is one of the weaknesses of a free market system.

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

#76

Post by geggam »

isolli wrote: post #22
geggam wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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"

Not quite: have a look at these charts [0]. I believe that such a massive disparity in arrest rates between blacks and whites cannot be explained just by economic factors. [0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/06/04/the-b...

Here is a study you might find interesting to add to yours

https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/income.html

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

#77

Post by tasuki »

andy_ppp wrote: post #59
AshishBora wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

What if the crime rate overall (and cost to the tax payer) ended up being substantially reduced with this system, would you still be against it?

Why should the crime rate end up reduced when you pay people to commit crime?

AshishBora's point was that crime rate overall would increase, as there's a clear financial incentive to start committing crime.

Reminds me of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect

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

#78

Post by jordanbeiber »

golergka wrote: post #58
TelmoMenezes wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a non-American, what I find mostly surprising are these two things: 1) that a society that mostly believes that a system of private businesses competing in a free market is the be all and end all of optimal resource allocation end up having the most expensive health care, higher education and apparently, prison system in the world; that this fact does not trigger more thought and discussion; 2) that despite incarc…

> optimal resource allocation This is a strange assumption. As a free market proponent and almost a libertarian, I don't base my argument on "optimal resource allocation", neither care that much for it; I assume that most economically right-wing people don't pursue this as a main goal either, and rather see it as a nice side effect.

Just a bit of defense to this assumtion:

When it comes to privatizing stuff that really should be handled by a welfare state the “optimal resource allocation” argument comes up frequently though.

And it completely misses the point of supporting a welfare state.

It’s of course not about being optimal with resources, it’s about providing the best standard of life to as many individuals as possible.

Do this and the number of incarcerated will most likely drop.

It’s all a big game of balance, the way I see things.

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

#79

Post by wallace_f »

CraigJPerry wrote: post #65
fxj wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the problem is that all three sectors that you cite, health care, higher education and prison system, there is no free market but they are oligopols where only a small number of big players can lever their weight and keep others out.

Is that not just a "no true Scotsman" argument? "there is no free market but they are oligopols" There used to be 12 private prison companies in 2000 but it appears there are only 3 now. The start of the journey was privatization of prisons. This is where that path has currently led. It is what it is, ergo free market didn't work?

The problem is private prisons openly lobby, and secretly collude, with the government to increase their profits.

This is also why insulin is expensive (the discoverers and patent holders made their patents freely available long ago). It's regulations which keep insulin, and other drugs, protected from competition and therefore can be expensive... Really, there are endless stories about this.

The gov vs private debate is kind of academic when the reality is a lot of the problem comes down to collusion and cheating from both of them.

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

#80

Post by vkhorikov »

anilakar wrote: post #71
fxj wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this is a compelling argument against gouvernment intervention, then why does it work so much better in europe where all three sectors are state-owned? The best example is switzerland, where the costs are a fraction of the costs in the U.S ( and which is not a "socialist" country at all).

[flagged]

Except that you can point to cases where free market does work.
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