Incarceration Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Incarceration - Essay Example Although prisons traditionally are deemed as rehabilitative units to correct and deter criminality, these penal institutions are doing the reverse: producing confirmed criminals incompetent to integrate into mainstream society. Prison conditions, prison populations and prison rates display the tragic terror of the public unable to reform felons. The private prison system is a growing industry which is nourished by tax payers dollars. Petty criminals are incarcerated with the tough and hardened criminals. This situation results in the violence being reproduced in both younger and inexperienced inmates. The deplorable conditions of the prisons are justified. Gross human rights abuses take place within the cells. Prisoners are beaten, fed unhealthy food, subjected to unsanitary rooms and sometimes, confined, and transported to prison quarters away from their home states, away from family support but far from their criminal networks. The imbalance in the races represented in prison only reflects the partiality of the justice system where judges sentence criminals based on their ethnicity or nationality. Incarceration rates describe the ratio of how many prisoners per population of 100,000 are committed to penitentiary institutions. The United States boasts the highest incarceration rate in the world: 753 per 100,000 people as at 2008. This ratio represents a 240 percent increase since 1980. This ratio means that 3.5% of the U.S. adult population is behind bars. Compared to the U.S, the rest of the world have much lower incarceration rates for example, Russia holds the second place with 629 per 100,000; Rwanda with 593 per 100,000 and Cuba with 531 per 100,000. Compare these numbers with Australia 134, Canada 116, England 153 and Japan 63 (Schmitt 2010).    The United States leads the list in incarceration rates because of the privatized prison system. The federal and state penitentiaries employ the facilities of private owners; therefore making imprisonment a mon ey-making business. In 2008, federal, state, and local prison institutions demanded $75 billion to keep supporting its inmate population. Criminologists observe that if  prisoners convicted of non-violent crimes were not incarcerated, prison costs would be reduced to $16.9 billion per year. Another reason for America's mass imprisonment is the discriminatory conviction of prisoners belonging to certain races, particularly Blacks and Hispanics which together make up about three-quarters of the prison population. The trend of longer prison terms for minor crimes also is a factor contributing to mass imprisonment.   The prison system is a system which systematically disenfranchises inmates, stripping from poor minorities a key right. As a result, a section of the population remains voiceless. The implications here become more political since in inner city constituents the residents cannot cast their vote and decide on government or even run for office. The exploitation in prison al so enriches the prison institution owners who take unfair advantage of the labor of inmates. Inmates are usually paid about 23 cents per hour-minimum wage law does not apply and is not enforced in prisons.