[lbo-talk] Why Are So Many Americans in Prison?

joanna 123hop at comcast.net
Sun Sep 9 15:49:01 PDT 2007


Nick C. Woomer-Deters wrote:


>1) "We have a corrections sector that employs more Americans than the
>combined work forces of General Motors, Ford, and Wal-Mart, the three
>largest corporate employers in the country" -- I knew it was huge, but
>not that huge -- I mean, wow.
>
>2) The "frontlash" theory described below sounds about right to me. I
>wonder if skyrocketing incarceration rates will emerge in Europe in
>response to increased unease about immigrant populations. Sarkozy's
>blustering aside, is there any indication that Europeans are growing
>more receptive to using incarceration as a major method of solving
>social ills?
>
>-WD
>
>
>
It was partly a reaction to the civil rights movement. It was also a jobs program for all those unionized industrial workers that lost everything in the seventies and eighties.

Joanna



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