MSN reports 1 in 36 Americans in jail, probation, etc.

MSN reported (with characteristic lack of detail when it comes to these topics) that 1 in 36 Americans are in prison, on parole, or on probation.

Click 'Read more' for more commentary.The actual report and supporting data charts can be downloaded here. I note in looking at this report that the authors broke down probation/parole statistics by gender, among other things; but they did not break down incarceration by gender. I find that interesting to say the least. If someone else finds this break-down, please post it. Even so, note the number of men v. women on parole as a percentage in 2003 for those persons on parole: 77% male to 23% female. If we (are forced to, essentially, for now) assume that the same ratio holds for incarceration, that would mean in 2003 of the 3.6% of Americans under penal supervision of some kind (including jail), 77% of that number of the locked up portion of adults is male. According to the report, the number of adults in jail or prison by e/o 2003 was 2,078,570 (on page 1 of the report, adding the jail and prison figures together). If the 77% figure holds true, this would mean 1,600,498 men are in jail in the U.S. (while only 478,072 women are in jail). Somehow though I don't think the 77/23 ratio holds; I imagine it is even greater for men than women, probably more like 85/15 or even 90/10.

Consider then that the US has a population of 138,053,563 men (see the census chart). Estimating therefore with a *conservative* figure of 1,600,498 men being in jail, this would mean 1.1% of the *male* population is in jail. But wait; we're including all males in this calculation at this point. Subtract males under 19 and over 59 and the number of males you have to work with is down to 77,262,100. OK, so now the %age of adult men under 59 in jail comes in at 2%. This means 2 in every 100 men (or every 1 in 50 if you prefer to think of it that way) in IN JAIL--not just on parole or "under supervision"-- IN JAIL. And this report indicates the trend of people in jail and "under supervision" is only going upward.

Read the report, by the way-- I think you will find the headings of certain areas quite telling. For example, one heading on page 4 reads "At year end 2003, 1 in 5 probationers were women; 1 in 3 were black". Well gee, this would mean 4 in 5 probationers are men and 2 in 3 were other-than-black (white, Asian, Latino, etc.) Given that these numbers are larger and have as much implication for society's well-being as anything else, why do you suppose they chose to call attention to statistical discrepancies this way? I'll leave it to you to figure out.

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http://news.mensactivism.org/articles/04/07/26/2228253.shtml