[PEN-L:6779] Re: EPR, prison, interest rates

[Doug Henwood <dhenwood@xxxxxxxxx>]

Robert Naiman wrote:

>So how does the U.S. look compared to other OECD countries if you count
>institutionalized adults as part of the population? Can one also account
>for the role of the military?

Well I was going to have a chart of international incarceration
comparisons, as part of the quarterly social indicator page I'm doing for
the Nation, but the magazine's editor didn't find mass incarceration an
appropriate topic. So I'll do it for LBO.

Here's a hint: no OECD country comes anywhere close to U.S. incarceration
rates. #1 is Russia (out of 180 studied); #2 is the U.S. Here are a few
countries per 100,000). About 20 will be charted in the next LBO.

INCARCERATION RATES
per 100,000 population, mid-1990s

Russia                 685
USA                    645
Israel                 190
S Korea                155
Portugal               145
United Kingdom         125
Canada                 115
Mexico                 110
France                  90
Japan                   40

If you counted all U.S. prisoners as unemployed, it would push up the U
rate from around 4.3% to 5.6%. Details also forthcoming in LBO.

Doug