The Moral Injustice and Economic Folly of Mass Incarceration: A Look at Criminal Justice in Baltimore, Maryland

At any given time there are approximately 2 million individuals incarcerated in the U.S. Though our country only accounts for 5% of the world’s population it houses about 25% of the world’s prisoners. Unwilling to invest... [ view full abstract ]

At any given time there are approximately 2 million individuals incarcerated in the U.S. Though our country only accounts for 5% of the world’s population it houses about 25% of the world’s prisoners. Unwilling to invest in programs that would raise our citizens out of poverty, the U.S. pours billions of dollars each year into a retributive system of justice that pushes people deeper into poverty and further marginalizes them, while failing to have much effect on crime. Why are we willing to spend so much on what is clearly a failed social experiment? Examples from a number of states show that it is possible to reduce incarceration and to simultaneously reduce crime rates; thus it is possible for us to make an economically sensible decision while also making a moral one. In this presentation I will draw on research that I am conducting as an intern for a Recidivism and Reentry start-up called RowdyOrbit Impact in Baltimore, Maryland. I will highlight the individual, familial, and societal costs of incarceration, thereby establishing the injustice of our criminal justice system. This research is the continuation of a semester project that I undertook for Privilege and Poverty in the fall of 2015.​