USA - The United States has 5% of the world's population

[ewok_poacher]

The United States has among the highest incarceration rates in the world. More people are behind bars in the United States than any other country. As of 2006, a record 7 million people were behind bars, on probation or on parole. Of the total, 2.2 million were incarcerated. The People's Republic of China ranks second with 1.5 million, even though China has many times more inhabitants than the US. The United States has 5% of the world's population and 25% of the world's incarcerated population.

Some feel the high levels of incarceration is because of the long sentences mandated under American law, especially for nonviolent crimes like theft and drug possession. Some also feel that repeat offenders are not properly handled and that more focus should be on rehabilitation, and that shorter sentences would even reduce the criminal culture in general and especially reduce re-arrest rates for first-time convicts. A survey showed that among the nearly 300,000 prisoners released, 67.5% were rearrested within 3 years, and 51.8% were back in prison. However, the study found no evidence that spending more time in prison raises the recidivism rate, and found that those serving the longest time, 61 months or more, had a significantly lower re-arrest rate (54.2%) than every other category of prisoner. This is most likely explained by the older average age of those released with the longest sentences, and the study shows a strong negative correlation between recidivism and age of release.
Some have criticized the United States for having a high amount of non-violent and victimless offenders incarcerated;half of all persons incarcerated under state jurisdiction are for non-violent offences, and 20% are incarcerated for drug offences."Human Rights Watch believes the extraordinary rate of incarceration in the United States wreaks havoc on individuals, families and communities, and saps the strength of the nation as a whole.
The United States spends an estimated $60 billion each year on corrections. The population of inmates housed in prisons and jails in the United States exceeds 2 million, with the per capita incarceration population higher than that officially reported by any other country. Because of its size and influence, the U.S. prison industry is often referred to as the prison-industrial complex. Criminal justice policy in the United States has also been criticized for the disproportionate representation of African Americans and other minorities.


http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/12/01/usdom14728.htm

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/1209-01.htm

http://www.reuters.com/article/domes...37053120070627

http://www.workers.org/2006/us/prisoners-0831/

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/1242368.stm

I am a little sickened by the United states treatment of it's population.

Reputation Comments on this post:

Nice compilation of information, good use of incorporating the links into the text.