09-02-2010, 05:26 PM
(09-02-2010, 05:04 PM)--Pete Wrote: Let's take that logic one step further. The percentage of criminals in a stable society is roughly constant. So, the more that are in jail, the fewer that are out and committing crimes. Naturally, the crime rate drops. So, in that sense, "tough on crime" works. But in the sense of making this a more law abiding culture, I think it is a dismal failure.
(Again, arguments from a point of view which is not my own... take with an unhealthily large grain of salt...)
Yes.
Some roughly constant % of people are bad apples. You can't fix people. You can't fix their culture*, at least, not in a political time frame. Trying to fix the crime rate by improving people is not much better than King Canute and the tides. "Tough on crime" might be a dismal failure, but we live in a dismal world, and society contains many dismal people.
If you want to "fix" crime, you have to go after the criminals. The more that are in jail, the fewer are out committing crimes. The incarceration rate should increase at least until the costs of jailing more exceed the costs of the crimes they would otherwise have committed, and maybe a little extra to be on the safe side.
-Jester
*You can, however, wreck it in fairly short order. See: Revolution, French.