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I don’t disagree but just wanted to say something: The whole point of money was to make it possible for 2+ good actors to do legal (and different) work/goods/s

I don’t disagree but just wanted to say something: The whole point of money was to make it possible for 2+ good actors to do legal (and different) work/goods/services for each other while profiting. Most people who end up in prison were “bad actors” by definition. The system was not benefiting from them. And thus I can’t help thinking that they don’t really deserve any of the system’s monetary medium of exchange.

ZainRiz 8y ago
Except they're not really "bad actors" Most people in prison today are there because of "drug offenses" which usually means they got caught doing drugs themselves (not dealing drugs or being involved in drug induced crimes).
- ghostbrainalpha 8y ago
  This is a REALLY common misconception. Including "drug offenses" the U.S. incarceration rate is 693 per 100,000. Excluding "drug offenses" the U.S. incarceration rate is still 625 per 100,000. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/releasing-drug-offenders-wont-end-mass-incarceration/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/releasing-drug-offender... I agree with you that we should get the drug offenders out. But the characterizations that "most people are in prison for drug offenses" should be updated.
  - wool_gather 8y ago
    Note, you have a minor misquote of the statistic from the article; it's 725 per 100000: > From BJS [Bureau of Justice Statistics], [...] an incarceration rate of about 725 people per 100,000 population. > Suppose every federal drug offender were released today. That would cut the incarceration rate to about 693 inmates per 100,000 population. Suppose further that every drug offender in a state prison were also released. That would get the rate down to 625
  - jaccarmac 8y ago
    Is incarceration rate not somewhat deceptive though? A more interesting statistic would be how many of each 100,000 had ever spent time in prison. From here on is only speculation and I'll do a deeper dive when I'm not on a phone. I'd like to see the rest of the statistics broken down by offense. Additionally I suspect that drug offenses would lead to repeated incarceration and perhaps eventually worse offenses. Most violent offenses are committed in the context of existing relationships though, so there are certainly non-policy and certainly non-drug-policy ways to address crime in the United States.
    - jaccarmac 8y ago
      The linked article is interesting but also slightly misrepresented. The 693 number is incarcerations without federal drug offenses. The change would be from 725/100k to 625/100k across state and federal, which is a slightly more significant change.
  - jakelazaroff 8y ago
    This is linked elsewhere in the thread (as well as that FiveThirtyEight article), but it bears repeating here: as far as the federal incarceration rate goes, the number is actually 46% [1]. Which isn't a majority, but it's damn close — and way too high. (It should go without saying that these are all simplistic lenses on a very complex, multifaceted problem, and in reality many parts of the justice system need reform.) [1] https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offenses.jsp https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offen...
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
ndespres 8y ago
I think you are wrong about "the whole point of money" and do not believe that profit is a requirement for currency to function. Money has many simple purposes outside of profit. Even taking your claim at face value, whether or not someone "deserves" to benefit from some profit-based exchange of labor for currency seems irrelevant. If work has a concrete value and someone is unable to receive fair compensation for that work, and all of the value is received by someone else who did not do the work, this is inherently unfair and unethical (and by definition, slavery).
haraldurt 8y ago
Is it preferred to release two bad actors or to release two good actors? Being in prison is a punishment, but it is also rehabilitation (ideally).
CptFribble 8y ago
Money is a tool, nothing more (ideologically). Calling on ideology to restrict potentially helpful uses of a tool is a dangerous path to tread. No matter what crime someone's committed, they're still a person, and if our goal is more productive members of society, cutting people off from the main tool for goods exchange will not move us toward that goal.
PhasmaFelis 8y ago
It's not about what criminals deserve, it's about how to make sure they stop being criminals. A broke ex-con without a support network is much more likely to return to crime just to survive. Helping them avoid that is a net gain to society as a whole, whether they deserve it or not. Focusing on what people "deserve", instead of on what's best for society, is the reason the US has the worst health care in the western world while also spending more tax money on health care per capita than anyone else on the planet. We'd rather spend 10 dollars making sure no one ever gets more than their fair share than risk one dollar going to someone who doesn't "deserve" it.
radiantswirl 8y ago
"The wise man trusts the trustworthy And he also trusts the untrustworthy In this way, he makes them trustworthy." -taoist proverb If you write prisoners off as "bad actors", if you add nebulous financial punishment to the explicit punishment of confinement that they already undergo, one of the main consequences of that extra punishment for "bad actors" you're supporting is that you make it a lot harder for "bad actors" to become "good actors." Is that really what you want? The price prisoners pay to society as penance for their crimes is confinement. We shouldn't also punish them with automatic demotion to a lower economic class like we currently do. The stigma around hiring prisoners amounts to "shadowbanning" prisoners from the economy because while technically they can participate, they're at a huge disadvantage. The only way for a "bad actor" to become a "good actor" is if we make it possible in the first place. That's why sometimes it makes sense to "Trust the untrustworthy."
jakelazaroff 8y ago
The point of a medium of exchange (money) is to make it easy for there to be a coincidence of wants between people who might transact. It has nothing to do with whether you're a "good" or "bad" actor.
- mpax 8y ago
  Well... sure, but it depends on how you look at it. In a monetary society (as opposed to credit or barter (intermediary like you suggest) — monetary circuitist terminology), money is created as a debt/credit tuple to facilitate an intertemporal private contract (tit-for-tat), of which cash is a physical token representation. The etymology of “credit” is “faith”, “honor”, “merit” etc. That of debt, at least in some germanic languages (“schuld”) literally means “guilt” and has connotations of sin and atonement.
  - solveit 8y ago
    I don't think arguments from etymology are of much relevance in modern economics, to put it mildly.
    - pmarreck 8y ago
      All value derives from subjective meanings, so you actually couldn't be more wrong
oathbreaker 8y ago
> Most people who end up in prison were “bad actors” by definition. Disagree. Majority of the offenders are there for non-violent drug offenses. It is also possible some of them are serving sentences for crimes that are no more crimes. California has liberalized marijuana but the prisoners are still in jail for the crimes that no more crimes.
- hnaccy 8y ago
  >Majority of the offenders are there for non-violent drug offenses. I don't believe this is true.
  - GW150914 8y ago
    If only we had access to some kind of worldwide network which would allows us t- -found it. https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offenses.jsp https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offen... 46% drug offenses, 6.8% immigration and we’re already past the 50% mark. That as they say, is a majority. Edit: Looking at all populations state, federal, local yields: https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2018.html https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2018.html Note: But the offense data oversimplifies how people interact with the criminal justice system. A person in prison for multiple offenses is reported only for the most serious offense so, for example, there are people in prison for “violent” offenses who might have also been convicted of a drug offense. Further, almost all convictions are the result of plea bargains, where people plead guilty to a lesser offense, perhaps of a different category or one that they may not have actually committed.
    - hnaccy 8y ago
      This doesn't count state systems, including those and it's ~20% drug offenses.
    - pmarreck 8y ago
      Why does this data disagree hugely with that? https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/releasing-drug-offenders-wont-end-mass-incarceration/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/releasing-drug-offender...

ZainRiz 8y ago

Except they're not really "bad actors" Most people in prison today are there because of "drug offenses" which usually means they got caught doing drugs themselves (not dealing drugs or being involved in drug induced crimes).

ghostbrainalpha 8y ago
This is a REALLY common misconception. Including "drug offenses" the U.S. incarceration rate is 693 per 100,000. Excluding "drug offenses" the U.S. incarceration rate is still 625 per 100,000. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/releasing-drug-offenders-wont-end-mass-incarceration/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/releasing-drug-offender... I agree with you that we should get the drug offenders out. But the characterizations that "most people are in prison for drug offenses" should be updated.
- wool_gather 8y ago
  Note, you have a minor misquote of the statistic from the article; it's 725 per 100000: > From BJS [Bureau of Justice Statistics], [...] an incarceration rate of about 725 people per 100,000 population. > Suppose every federal drug offender were released today. That would cut the incarceration rate to about 693 inmates per 100,000 population. Suppose further that every drug offender in a state prison were also released. That would get the rate down to 625
- jaccarmac 8y ago
  Is incarceration rate not somewhat deceptive though? A more interesting statistic would be how many of each 100,000 had ever spent time in prison. From here on is only speculation and I'll do a deeper dive when I'm not on a phone. I'd like to see the rest of the statistics broken down by offense. Additionally I suspect that drug offenses would lead to repeated incarceration and perhaps eventually worse offenses. Most violent offenses are committed in the context of existing relationships though, so there are certainly non-policy and certainly non-drug-policy ways to address crime in the United States.
  - jaccarmac 8y ago
    The linked article is interesting but also slightly misrepresented. The 693 number is incarcerations without federal drug offenses. The change would be from 725/100k to 625/100k across state and federal, which is a slightly more significant change.
- jakelazaroff 8y ago
  This is linked elsewhere in the thread (as well as that FiveThirtyEight article), but it bears repeating here: as far as the federal incarceration rate goes, the number is actually 46% [1]. Which isn't a majority, but it's damn close — and way too high. (It should go without saying that these are all simplistic lenses on a very complex, multifaceted problem, and in reality many parts of the justice system need reform.) [1] https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offenses.jsp https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offen...
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

ndespres 8y ago

I think you are wrong about "the whole point of money" and do not believe that profit is a requirement for currency to function. Money has many simple purposes outside of profit. Even taking your claim at face value, whether or not someone "deserves" to benefit from some profit-based exchange of labor for currency seems irrelevant. If work has a concrete value and someone is unable to receive fair compensation for that work, and all of the value is received by someone else who did not do the work, this is inherently unfair and unethical (and by definition, slavery).

haraldurt 8y ago

Is it preferred to release two bad actors or to release two good actors? Being in prison is a punishment, but it is also rehabilitation (ideally).

CptFribble 8y ago

Money is a tool, nothing more (ideologically). Calling on ideology to restrict potentially helpful uses of a tool is a dangerous path to tread. No matter what crime someone's committed, they're still a person, and if our goal is more productive members of society, cutting people off from the main tool for goods exchange will not move us toward that goal.

PhasmaFelis 8y ago

It's not about what criminals deserve, it's about how to make sure they stop being criminals. A broke ex-con without a support network is much more likely to return to crime just to survive. Helping them avoid that is a net gain to society as a whole, whether they deserve it or not. Focusing on what people "deserve", instead of on what's best for society, is the reason the US has the worst health care in the western world while also spending more tax money on health care per capita than anyone else on the planet. We'd rather spend 10 dollars making sure no one ever gets more than their fair share than risk one dollar going to someone who doesn't "deserve" it.

radiantswirl 8y ago

"The wise man trusts the trustworthy And he also trusts the untrustworthy In this way, he makes them trustworthy." -taoist proverb If you write prisoners off as "bad actors", if you add nebulous financial punishment to the explicit punishment of confinement that they already undergo, one of the main consequences of that extra punishment for "bad actors" you're supporting is that you make it a lot harder for "bad actors" to become "good actors." Is that really what you want? The price prisoners pay to society as penance for their crimes is confinement. We shouldn't also punish them with automatic demotion to a lower economic class like we currently do. The stigma around hiring prisoners amounts to "shadowbanning" prisoners from the economy because while technically they can participate, they're at a huge disadvantage. The only way for a "bad actor" to become a "good actor" is if we make it possible in the first place. That's why sometimes it makes sense to "Trust the untrustworthy."

jakelazaroff 8y ago

The point of a medium of exchange (money) is to make it easy for there to be a coincidence of wants between people who might transact. It has nothing to do with whether you're a "good" or "bad" actor.

mpax 8y ago
Well... sure, but it depends on how you look at it. In a monetary society (as opposed to credit or barter (intermediary like you suggest) — monetary circuitist terminology), money is created as a debt/credit tuple to facilitate an intertemporal private contract (tit-for-tat), of which cash is a physical token representation. The etymology of “credit” is “faith”, “honor”, “merit” etc. That of debt, at least in some germanic languages (“schuld”) literally means “guilt” and has connotations of sin and atonement.
- solveit 8y ago
  I don't think arguments from etymology are of much relevance in modern economics, to put it mildly.
  - pmarreck 8y ago
    All value derives from subjective meanings, so you actually couldn't be more wrong

oathbreaker 8y ago

> Most people who end up in prison were “bad actors” by definition. Disagree. Majority of the offenders are there for non-violent drug offenses. It is also possible some of them are serving sentences for crimes that are no more crimes. California has liberalized marijuana but the prisoners are still in jail for the crimes that no more crimes.

hnaccy 8y ago
>Majority of the offenders are there for non-violent drug offenses. I don't believe this is true.
- GW150914 8y ago
  If only we had access to some kind of worldwide network which would allows us t- -found it. https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offenses.jsp https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offen... 46% drug offenses, 6.8% immigration and we’re already past the 50% mark. That as they say, is a majority. Edit: Looking at all populations state, federal, local yields: https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2018.html https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2018.html Note: But the offense data oversimplifies how people interact with the criminal justice system. A person in prison for multiple offenses is reported only for the most serious offense so, for example, there are people in prison for “violent” offenses who might have also been convicted of a drug offense. Further, almost all convictions are the result of plea bargains, where people plead guilty to a lesser offense, perhaps of a different category or one that they may not have actually committed.
  - hnaccy 8y ago
    This doesn't count state systems, including those and it's ~20% drug offenses.
  - pmarreck 8y ago
    Why does this data disagree hugely with that? https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/releasing-drug-offenders-wont-end-mass-incarceration/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/releasing-drug-offender...