Hi – it’s Paul from Civic Action. I recently wrote a Business Insider piece about America’s mass incarceration problem, and I wanted to share the key points with you because it’s such an important issue.

While the United States makes up less than 5% of the global population, our prison system holds approximately 20% of the world's total prison population. When you step back and look at the demographics of the people incarcerated, a larger and more malicious problem becomes apparent. When you consider the fact that Black people are five to seven times more likely to be imprisoned for drug offenses than white people, it becomes apparent that justice in America isn't blind – it's perpetuating racist systems.

The criminal justice system, with all its inequities, extracts a heavy economic price that ultimately affects all Americans in a number of ways:

* The Prison Policy Initiative estimated that the true economic cost of incarceration in the U.S. is about $180 billion per year.
* Americans who enter the prison system have lower levels of wealth over the course of their lives and find it harder to get credit or loans because of punitive practices even after they’ve exited prison.
* Individuals lose close to $30,000 when detained in jail while simply awaiting the resolution of their criminal cases, even if they're eventually found innocent.
* Children of incarcerated people bear the financial and physical brunt of a parent being incarcerated as well.
* Those who have spent their lives in prisons may not have been able to contribute to Social Security, which is an essential retirement resource for minority populations in particular.


Throwing people in prison only worsens the problems of poverty and systemic racism. Instead, the U.S. should make investments in line with what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and others argued and address the root causes, which are inequality in opportunity. We must invest in education for underserved communities, from preschool all the way to university, and address inequities in employment and housing – only then can we begin making progress.

By building equitable economic solutions for everyone, our country can put an end to our shameful standing as the worst jailer in the world – not to mention that it could cost the U.S. a lot less money to do the right thing.

If you would like to spread the word about the economic cost of our country’s mass incarceration problem, you can share my Business Insider piece with your social networks by clicking one of the options below:

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Thanks for reading, 

Paul Constant



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