America’s incarceration rate falls to lowest level since 1995 The nation’s incarceration rate peaked at 1,000 inmates per 100,000 adults during the three-year period between 2006 and 2008. It has declined steadily since then and, at the end of 2019, was at the same level as in 1995 (810 inmates per 100,000 adults). The number of prison and jail inmates in the U.S. has also decreased in recent years, though not as sharply as the incarceration rate, which takes population change into account. The estimated 2,086,600 inmates who were in prison or jail at the end of 2019 were the fewest since 2003, when there were 2,086,500. The prison and jail population peaked at 2,310,300 in 2008. It is not yet clear how the coronavirus pandemic may have affected the U.S. incarceration rate; statistics for 2020 are not expected to be released until later this year. But media reports suggest that the decline in incarceration may have continued and perhaps even accelerated in 2020. A variety of factors help explain why U.S. incarceration trends have been on a downward trajectory. Violent and property crime rates have declined sharply in recent decades despite a more recent increase in certain violent crimes, especially murder. As crime has declined, so have arrests: The nationwide arrest rate has fallen steadily over the long term. Changes in criminal laws, as well as prosecution and judicial sentencing patterns, also likely play a role in the declining incarceration rate and number of people behind bars. In late 2018, for example, then-President Donald Trump signed a law aimed at reducing the federal prison population. In its first year, the law led to shorter sentences for thousands of federal offenders and earlier release dates for many others, according to a 2020 report from the U.S. Sentencing Commission.
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/08/16/americas-incarceration-rate-lowest-since-1995/ "Despite this decline, the United States incarcerates a larger share of its population than any other country for which data is available."
I'm all for reviewing laws that keep minor drug offenders in prison for decades, but the bad guys doing the murdering need to be inside.
Bill Clinton concedes role in mass incarceration Clinton signed into law an omnibus crime bill in 1994 that included the federal “three strikes” provision, mandating life sentences for criminals convicted of a violent felony after two or more prior convictions, including drug crimes. On Wednesday, Clinton acknowledged that policy’s role in over-incarceration in an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour. “The problem is the way it was written and implemented is we cast too wide a net and we had too many people in prison,” Clinton said Wednesday. “And we wound up…putting so many people in prison that there wasn’t enough money left to educate them, train them for new jobs and increase the chances when they came out so they could live productive lives.”
The former president’s argument is that the legislation was necessary because of national concern about crime, particularly in the African-American community. He argues that Senator Biden advised him that punitive sentencing policies needed to be in the bill in order for it to pass. Further, he asserts, the legislation was a success, as demonstrated by the substantial decline in crime and violence since its passage.
The US had the Highest Rate of Imprisonment in World prior to the 1994 crime bill.The NYT headline I posted is from 1991. Indeed Biden and Clinton made it worse