Incarceration vs Crime Rates

This graph clearly illustrates the DISCONNECT between crime rates and incarceration rates. Incarceration has had a small effect on the violent crime and property crime rates over time. However when you put this up against the collateral and direct damage caused by the expansion of prisons, one has to ask: “Is this small drop in crime worth the high economic, social, and moral costs of incarceration?” The answer to this must be an unequivocal “NO!” We have expanded the numbers of people under “correctional’ supervision over the past 30 years with no concomittant precipitous drop in rates of crime.

It’s time for a different solution. And fast.