Costs of incarceration
Costs of Incarceration
Introduction to Corrections
Incarceration Costs
Money is a huge issue with problems in America and in America the costs for corrections is going up every year. Some may argue that this is because of more people getting in trouble, jails are too full, or others may argue that the programs are not working to cut down recidivism rates. Regardless of what argument one makes this research paper shows results on how worth a program is based on money and recidivism rates and whether or not incarceration should be an option to reduce recidivism. In 2009, the United States Department of Justice (USDOJ) requested $6.8 billion for prisoner detention, which is an increase of $136,000,000 from 2008 (USDOJ, 2008). Concurrently, a conservative estimate of the cost for one career criminal a decade ago was $1,500,000 (Cohen, 1998) and has now substantially increased to between $2,600,000 to $5,300,000 (Cohen & Piquero, 2009). Similarly, the direct cost of incarceration is approximately $20,000 to $40,000 per offender (Spelman, 2009). Tax payers, who financially support the justice system, are forced into an economic and social bind. Money like this is the reason why research is being done to see whether or not the tax payers’ dollars are really worth the spending on incarceration or other options. If the average cost of incarceration is $20,000 to $40,000 per offender then imagine separate programs that the prisoner’s will go through to cut their time down. The biggest issue here is not wasting the money on prisoner’s to just lower sentencing, but rather help fix the offender and get him/her back on the streets a better person and to not come back. In other words try and cut down recidivism rates.
RNR
The principal that the correctional system is set up to follow in order to help offenders is on a risk-need-responsibility or RNR principal (Andrews et al., 1990a). The purpose of the study was to determine whether or not programs that
Introduction to Corrections
Incarceration Costs
Money is a huge issue with problems in America and in America the costs for corrections is going up every year. Some may argue that this is because of more people getting in trouble, jails are too full, or others may argue that the programs are not working to cut down recidivism rates. Regardless of what argument one makes this research paper shows results on how worth a program is based on money and recidivism rates and whether or not incarceration should be an option to reduce recidivism. In 2009, the United States Department of Justice (USDOJ) requested $6.8 billion for prisoner detention, which is an increase of $136,000,000 from 2008 (USDOJ, 2008). Concurrently, a conservative estimate of the cost for one career criminal a decade ago was $1,500,000 (Cohen, 1998) and has now substantially increased to between $2,600,000 to $5,300,000 (Cohen & Piquero, 2009). Similarly, the direct cost of incarceration is approximately $20,000 to $40,000 per offender (Spelman, 2009). Tax payers, who financially support the justice system, are forced into an economic and social bind. Money like this is the reason why research is being done to see whether or not the tax payers’ dollars are really worth the spending on incarceration or other options. If the average cost of incarceration is $20,000 to $40,000 per offender then imagine separate programs that the prisoner’s will go through to cut their time down. The biggest issue here is not wasting the money on prisoner’s to just lower sentencing, but rather help fix the offender and get him/her back on the streets a better person and to not come back. In other words try and cut down recidivism rates.
RNR
The principal that the correctional system is set up to follow in order to help offenders is on a risk-need-responsibility or RNR principal (Andrews et al., 1990a). The purpose of the study was to determine whether or not programs that