There’s a reason people call the United States the “land of the free” with a sarcastic bent to it these days.
Here’s why:
As of the 2010 Census, 2.3 million people were incarcerated. That’s roughly 707 people out of every 100,000 – a ratio far exceeding the rest of the world – and the numbers are rising all the time. Perhaps you’ve heard the phrase, the “prison industrial complex”? That’s what we’re talking about here, and the interactive map below will help you visualize what is truly becoming an epidemic in this country.
How?
By illustrating exactly where the least to greatest number of inmates currently live in their quaint cinder block home-sweet-homes, including juvenile offenders.
And this map doesn’t just cover prisons, but local and county jails as well. The lighter the shade, the fewer inmates incarcerated. The darker the hue for each county, state by state, the greater number of inmates are housed in that region.
Take a look:
What’s most disturbing about this map and these numbers, however, is the context they can be placed in.
Looking over the data, it becomes emphatically clear that the “land of the free” actually has far more prisons and jails in it than colleges and universities – approximately 5,000 more. Additionally, some areas of the country in the South actually house more citizens in prison than they do on college campuses.
To get an idea of the degree to which this is true, consider Cumberland County, Pa., where one can find 41 correctional facilities, yet only seven higher learning institutions serving a population of roughly 235,000 people. In Lexington County, S.C., there is only one college for every 15 detention centers.
Because different areas of the country choose to disperse their jails and prisons in different manners from region to region, some sections are largely free from incarcerated populations, whereas as others are marred with clusters of them.
Take a look at the nice prison belt going clear across the middle of Michigan’s mitten, for example. Artist Josh Begley shares some nice handy work to show the visual impact prisons and jails have in numerous communities around the country – likely soon to be coming to a neighborhood near YOU, at our current rate of incarceration. Wouldn’t you just love one of Begley’s little beauties a mile away from your home?
Due to the differing preferences in how and where inmates are housed, some regions of the country actually boast zero inmates whatsoever; whereas in other areas, inmates can sometimes make up a hearty section of the local population, even going up so high as 30 percent in some places.
With a growing awareness of America’s incarceration habit growing ever-larger and ever more menacing and absurd, many citizens, organizations and politicians have begun looking at ways to reduce incarceration levels, though for a variety of different reasons. The largest reason all three typically agree on, however, is the enormous cost burdening the U.S. infrastructure to house so many inmates. The frustration and poor logic of the practice only amplifies when one considers the numerous trivial reasons one can end up in jail or prison.
One means for reducing the population of incarcerated citizens is to finally give up the ghost on the War on Drugs, of course. Alternative sentences for nonviolent crimes is another solution that can likely help, in addition to finding a means for dealing with the heavy incarcerated population of the mentally ill. Put the drug addicts in rehab, give the mentally ill appropriate mental health services, and have what’s becoming modern debtor’s prison inmates complete community service. That should kick things off in a new direction nicely.
But to underline the point, how will we ever figure out better solutions for the future if we’re locking up far more people than we are educating on a higher level, and building far more prisons than universities?
H/T: washingtonpost.com | Featured image: pixabay.com
seems like the jail more people where its hot
When the War on Drugs is finally ended what do we do about inmates serving time for something that is now legal? Case study after alcohol was re-legalized. Politicians had the same dilemma. So they immediately released those there for alcohol crimes that had no other crimes associated, just alcohol, left in the first wave. Second was those that had associated crimes, was it violence or nonviolent, and just kept the paroling rolling until they had finished.
So we got an overcrowding problem we could solve immediately.
If they would re-institute prison work gangs and hard-labor sentences, we could cut the prison population drastically, because most of those bozos would do their best to stay out of prison so they wouldn’t have to work, God forbid!
You have no idea what this is all about do you?
Nearly Half Of Black Males, 40
Percent Of White Males Are Arrested By Age 23: Study
By Simon
McCormackPosted: 01/06/2014
We are living in boom
times for the private prison industry. The Corrections Corporation of America
(CCA), the nation’s largest owner of private prisons, has seen its revenue
climb by more than 500 percent in the last two decades. And CCA wants to
get much, much bigger: Last year, the company made an offer to 48 governors to buy and operate their
state-funded prisons. But what made CCA’s pitch to those governors so audacious
and shocking was that it included a so-called occupancy requirement, a clause
demanding the state keep those newly privatized prisons at least 90 percent
full at all times, regardless of whether crime was rising or falling