Draft of Informative Report

 

Mass Incarceration of Minorities vs Majorities

Anderson Lopez

Prof. Nargiza Matyakubova

ENG 201 – English Composition

07 October, 2020

 

 

Mass Incarceration of Minorities vs Majorities

 

Abstract

                       Is Mass Incarceration of Minorities vs Majorities a reality or it’s just fiction. A fact is that the U.S. has nearly 25% of the world’s prison population. But what can lead to this absurd number in the U.S. Some factors leading could be discrimination to minorities, a broken criminal justice system, education, and investments from government into university or prisons to help or no at minorities. Through this research we will find out, how each of these factors are involved on Mass Incarceration.

                       According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Criminal Justice is the second-fastest-growing category of state budgets, behind only Medicaid, and 90% of that spending goes to prisons. We are wasting trillions of dollars on an ineffective and unjust criminal justice system. We have more effective tools or ways to prevent and respond to crime other than prisons. (ACLU)

 

 

 

Discrimination and Marginalization

                       In the United States, 39 percent of African-American children and adolescents and 33 percent of Latino children and adolescents are living in poverty, which is more than double the 14 percent poverty rate for non-Latino, white, and Asian children and adolescents (Kids Count Data Center, Children in Poverty, 2014).

                            Although the income of Asian American families often falls markedly above other minorities, these families often have four to five family members working (Le, 2008). African-Americans (53 percent) and Latinos (43 percent) are more likely to receive high-cost mortgages than Caucasians (18 percent; Logan, 2008)

 

Broken Criminal Justice System

                       Decades of “tough on crime” policies have given prosecutors enormous power over the system in their jurisdiction. District attorneys decide who will be detained in jail before their court date, and who will be sent to state prison. They decide what crimes to charge, and they control the plea deals offered. With 95 percent of those incarcerated having taken plea deals – including people who have pleaded guilty to a crime they didn’t commit to avoid the risk of a longer sentence or because they were under duress – prosecutors largely control who ends up behind bars. (ACLU, Prosecutorial Reform)

                      Prosecutors also constitute a powerful lobby and they often oppose sensible bipartisan reform efforts that would reduce incarceration and create more effective, less costly alternatives to jails and prisons. (ACLU, Prosecutorial Reform).

 

Education

                       Despite dramatic changes, large gaps remain when minority education attainment and outcomes are compared to white Americans.

                       African-Americans and Latinos are more likely to attend high-poverty schools than Asian-Americans and Caucasians (National Center for Education Statistics, 2007)

                       From 2000 to 2013 the dropout rate between racial groups narrowed significantly. However, high school dropout rates among Latinos remain the highest, followed by African-Americans and the Whites (National Center for Education Statistics, 2015).

                       In addition to socioeconomic realities that may deprive students of valuable resources, high-achieving African American students may be exposed to less rigorous curriculums, attend schools with fewer resources, and have teachers who expect less of them academically than they expect to similarly situated Caucasian students (Azzam, 2008).

                       12.4 percent of African-American college graduates between the ages of 22 and 27 were unemployed in 2013, which is more than double the rate of unemployment among all college graduates in the same age range (5.6 percent; J. Jones & Schmitt, 2014).

 

Investment on Cellblocks or Classrooms

                       States around the country spent more building prisons than colleges in 1995 for the first time. That year there was nearly a dollar-for-dollar tradeoff between corrections and higher education, with university construction funds decreasing by $954 million to (2.5 billion) while corrections funding increased by $926 million to (2.6 billion). (Justice Policy Institute, 1997)

                       From 1984 to 1994, California built 21 prisons and only one state university. During that decade, the prison system realized a 209% increase in funding, compared to a 15% increase in state university funding. (Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice, 1997).

                       In New York, between 1988 and 1998, the state spent $761 million more on corrections, while spending on state colleges and universities declined by $615 million. (Justice Policy Institute, 1998).

                       During the 1990s, the state of Maryland’s prison budget increased by $147 million, while its university budget decreased by $29 million. (Justice Policy Institute, 1998).

 

                       Through this research, we understood that there is some patterns between states and society that contributes to Mass Incarceration of Minorities, as discuss discrimination, education, and even a broken criminal justice system, that all it wants is to keep people in prisons or jails, but something that really scares above all, it’s how the government is investing billions building new prisons, and no school or colleges for the American People.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Work Cited.

 

-Justice Policy Institute, Cellblocks or Classrooms? The Funding of Higher Education and Corrections and Its Impact on African American Men http://www.justicepolicy.org/research/2046

-Azzam, A. M. (2008). Neglecting higher achievers. Educational Leadership, 66, 90-92. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership.aspx

-Jones, J., & Schmitt, J. (2014). A college degree is no guarantee (No. 2014-08). Retrieved from http://cepr.net/publications/reports/a-college-degree-is-no-guarantee

-National Center for Education Statistics. (2007). Status and trends in the education of racial and ethnic minorities. Retrieved from  http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2007/minoritytrends/

-National Center for Education Statistics. (2015). The condition of education 2015 (NCES 2015-144). Retrieved from https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2015/2015144.pdf

-(ACLU 100 years) https://www.aclu.org/issues/smart-justice/prosecutorial-reform

-U.S. Census Bureau. (2014). U.S. poverty report. Retrieved from https://www.census.gov/population/projections/data/national/2014.html

-Logan, A. (2008, April 29). The state of minorities: How are minorities faring in the economy? Retrieved from https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/race/news/2008/04/29/4283/the-state-of-minorities/