Friday, February 29, 2008

Child Poverty and How to Stem America's Prison Madness

Go to Huffington Post original
Criminals, especially violent criminals, must be punished appropriately for their actions. Many deserve to go to jail.

America has followed this simplistic rationale for decades, and our prison population has ballooned to an all-time high. A jarring New York Times story reports that 1 in 99.1 Americans is currently behind bars. The cost for keeping them there last year was $44 billion, and that price is expected to rise to nearly $70 billion by 2011.

These out-of-control statistics are a national disgrace.

America's disproportionate investment in corrections rather than prevention maintains what the Children's Defense Fund aptly calls the "Cradle to Prison Pipeline." This system is a terrible short-term and long-term investment, both fiscally and in lives.

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