Mr. Fabian
English 10
18 December 2014
“Since the 1970s the rate of incarceration in the United States has quadrupled, after having been relatively flat over the prior half-century.”-Anthony Zurcher. The rate of prison incarcerations has increased so much over the years; the government can’t afford to incarcerate that many people. Karen Thomas’s article “Time to Invest in Schools, Note Prisons” shows that United States incarcerates too many criminals violent and non-violent. Joan Petersilia said in her article “Beyond the Prison Bubble” that, the United States has the highest incarceration rate of any free nation. This also supports the idea that The United States incarcerates too many people.
Karen Thomas’s article “Time to Invest in Schools, Not Prisons” shows that the United States is home to 5% of the world’s population but houses 25% of the world’s prisoners (314). This statistic shows that the United States incarcerates too many criminals, …show more content…
The environment of being incarcerated really affects non-violent criminals in a negative way. When non-violent criminals enter the environment of violent convicts it tends to change them to being violent. Then when they get released they tend to go back to jail for a violent crime. Then after that nonviolent convict turns into a violent criminal it becomes harder to have a good public life. Just because you did time it becomes harder to apply for colleges or jobs, to get food stamps and even vote (Glazek p. 310). When you apply for a job it’s really hard to get a good job after you get released from jail, due to the fact that employers look at their record it is harder to find descent jobs. This means that if a parent for example just got out of jail and applied for a job it’s hard for them to provide sustenance for their