Great question: I would guess about 15% of the inmate population sends mail home on any given day. That number certainly jumps up if a facility is locked down, probably by at least double.
I have a friend who did some time a decade or so ago (I'm uncertain if it was a federal or state prison) and one thing I've noted about him is how much he values books, even stuff like manuals and outdated reference material (we're in a volunteer group and we were cleaning up a room with a bunch of trash). His explanation to me was that in prison there wasn't much to do and so he spent his time reading as much stuff as he could get his hands on.
From your experience, would you say that the average rate of reading amongst inmates is higher than the general population? In person I've hardly met anyone who reads books other than for school assignments.
I know a ton of people in person who read a lot for pleasure, but I'm sure it's kind of self selecting. Are you in college? College was the time in my life I read the least.
Also, while I haven't been to prison, I've been to jail for a short cannabis related stay in the early 2010s. There is just so much less to do there that I ended up reading a whole book (2-300p) every day I was there. Many others had a book, but I'm not sure they were actually reading them. A lot of people in there were reading the Bible or some religious literature. Anyway, just my anecdote.
Nah, I'm in my 20s but already graduated. That said, most of my friends are guys from a church group and are 40+. I take back what I said a bit though. I know two of them who like to read spiritual stuff, but the rest don't read books and do social media or TikTok only.