The truth is, no one knows exactly how many people should be locked up at any given time. But it is certainly less than the total number of “offenders,” and it is therefore entirely possible to have an over-incarceration problem even if, as Latzer correctly notes, “many offenders go unpunished.” Read Full Article »
Mass Incarceration Is in the Eye of the Beholder
Even
though America has by far the highest incarceration rate in the world, Barry Latzer says it is “clear that we aren’t incarcerating too many people.” Why? In a nutshell, because we lock up fewer people than actually commit crimes, and “we don’t overpunish” by locking them up for too long. Ergo, he suggests, mass incarceration is a myth and not something we should be worried about. I disagree.
The truth is, no one knows exactly how many people should be locked up at any given time. But it is certainly less than the total number of “offenders,” and it is therefore entirely possible to have an over-incarceration problem even if, as Latzer correctly notes, “many offenders go unpunished.” Read Full Article »
The truth is, no one knows exactly how many people should be locked up at any given time. But it is certainly less than the total number of “offenders,” and it is therefore entirely possible to have an over-incarceration problem even if, as Latzer correctly notes, “many offenders go unpunished.” Read Full Article »
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