U.S. Mass Incarceration Levels Decline Towards World Average… In a Hundred Years
By Name | August 18, 2013 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
On July 25, a New York Times headline read, “U.S. Prison Populations Decline, Reflecting New Approach to Crime.” The article asserts there is “a shift away from an almost four-decade policy of mass imprisonment.” It claims experts say this is a “sea change” in America’s approach to criminal punishment. And it quotes a ruling class criminology expert saying, “This is the beginning of the end of mass incarceration.” All this because the federal government announced that the number of inmates in state and federal prisons decreased by 1.7 percent, to an estimated 1,571,013 in 2012 from 1,598,783 in 2011.
The U.S. imprisons six times as many people as any other country, compared to its population. And that doesn’t begin to tell the story, since incarceration rates for African-Americans and many section of Latino people are six times the rate of other people.
Of all the oppressive regimes on the planet earth, none come close to the United States in locking up their populace. But, at the current rate of reported decline in prison population*, assuming other countries continue locking people up at the same rate they do now, the U.S. incarceration rate should decline to average world levels in just a little over one hundred years.
Such is what qualifies as a “sea change” in America’s approach to criminal punishment according to the most influential liberal ruling class mouthpiece, the New York Times.
* The reported rate of decline is for federal prisons, here we are applying that rate of decline to the rest of the prison population.
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