United States incarceration rate | Hacker News Reader

United States incarceration rate

en.wikipedia.org

32 pointsa3voices18 comments

I had not previously been aware of how extreme the ratio is for men vs women on incarceration. Appears to be 12 to 13 times higher.

(from that wiki entry) http://i.imgur.com/IyBNmuk.png

Is this because men are much more likely to use + sell drugs, much more likely to be violent, or are targeted more heavily?

I think it's because male psychology leads men to being larger risk takers.

What are you guy, eleven years-old??? hint: most police are men, they don't like to beat up or arrest women

> I think it's because male psychology leads men to being larger risk takers.

Without citing a source, you might as well say black psychology leads blacks to being larger risk takers. Otherwise you're just describing your stereotype.

I would think it to be generally known, but apparently, it isn't, but many scientists think men are higher risk takers than women. If you google "men higher risk takers evolution", you will find, for example:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/evolution/9005552/Men-twi... "They said the gap between men and women when it came to risk-taking was 'unexpected in its magnitude.'"

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~kruger/risk.html: "More frequent risk taking among young men than women has been explained as a sexually selected trait, perhaps advertising male quality."

http://www.epjournal.net/wp-content/uploads/ep062942.pdf: "Men are also more likely than females to cross busy roads when it is risky to do so."

Do you believe there are no differences in the AVERAGE male and female psyche?

There isn't an established cause for the correlation, but I'd be more willing to say it's for the same reason that we have a similar ratio in the military, except more extreme because it's not something we can actively do something about.

There is a huge disparity in the crimes for which men are charged (and then also for which they are convicted).

I don't have a citation for the statistics offhand, but from my work in drug policy, I can tell you that men and women (in the aggregate) are convicted of very different drug crimes.

Put another way, if you went to a men's prison and a women's prison and took a random survey just of the inmates who are serving time due to drug-related crimes, you'd end up with very different cross-sections.

Given Hacker News's passion for North Korea, we should note Wikipedia, citing "Committee for Human Rights in North Korea (2012) The Hidden Gulag, 2nd ed.", lists a rate for North Korea (6-8 per 1,000) about the same as the United States (7 per 1,000).

This page -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcera... -- lists several countries with comparable rates not fully treated in the page in the original link.

I think a more accurate estimate for North Korea would be 999 per 1000. I'd rather live in a US prison...

We are number one! USA! USA! Oh, hold on ... this is a bad thing.

Fortunately, the United States appears to be at a two-decade low in new prison admissions:

http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2014/01/chart-lead-vio...

I can't help but think having growth rates that high over a thirty year period would be awesome for a business.

This isn't such a big problem as it may seem because unlike other countries, average prison terms in USA are extremely lengtly, and a lot of people with 50+ years terms, or even multiple life sentences die in prisons. So while a lot of people are in jail, not so many go there every year as in many countries, and even fewer come out, and many of those who do come out too old to be of a big problem.

In many other countries with much lower incarceration rates, the rate of people at large with prison history is much higher, which makes societies criminalized even down to the national character (see 'why Russians don't smile' - spoiler - smile is a sign of submission in prison).

How many of those are incarcerated for "digital" crimes?

That's a good question. My prediction is that this will exponentially increase though as the government finds new things to criminalize, and develops more effective and cheaper tools to hunt criminals.

It seems my bookmark somehow changed to CNN.com by itself.

A wikipedia page? Really?

Is TIL next?

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