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While I agree with the conclusion. People tend to overestimate the fraction of people incarcerated for non-violent drug offenses. It is only ~15% https://www.
by avsteele 6y ago
While I agree with the conclusion. People tend to overestimate the fraction of people incarcerated for non-violent drug offenses.
It is only ~15%
https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2020.html https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2020.html
- avsteele 6y agoAnd I'm assuming they mean incarcerated (jail+prison) and not just 'jail'. Most of the people in jail are awaiting trial, people in prison have been convicted.
- quietbritishjim 6y agoThe article linked in the comment you're replying to seems to include both jail and prison. The comment itself didn't mention either and just said "incarcerated".
- greatgirl 6y ago> Only 2% of federal criminal defendants go to trial, and most who do are found guilty From pew research
- greatgirl 6y agoThat's about where i expected it to be actually, and that's about 200k people, so it's pretty bad.
- coffeemaniac 6y ago15% of the US prison population is a huge number of people.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- hwillis 6y agoThat's state only; in total it's ~20%. That still hugely misses the point, because sentences are not equal. Violent offenders serve on average 4.7 years while drug offenders serve under 2 years. ~40% of people who are sent to state prison are sent with drugs as the most serious charge. https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/tssp16.pdf https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/tssp16.pdf