Notes from the Field

Submitted by Frank Murphy, April 14, 2011

Last Tuesday I published a post that examined the misguided budget funding priorities of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.  In the budget proposal offered by Governor Corbett for the 20011 fiscal year, he has suggested increasing the allocation to the state prison system by 11%.  His proposal also recommends a 10% cut to public K-12 schools and a whooping reduction of aid to state colleges of 50%.  In my post, I pointed out that these fiscal recommendations are exactly of the type referred to in a recent report released by the NAACP titled “Misplaced Priorities”.

Nationally, $70 billion is spent in a year to incarcerate 2.3 million people in American prisons.  Another 7.3 million people who are either on parole or probation, are also being monitored.   Although the population of our nation is equal to 5% of the world’s population, the prison systems of America detain 25% of the world’s prisoners.

“The majority of the 2.3 million people incarcerated in U.S. prisons and jails are people of color, people with mental health issues and drug addiction, people with low levels of educational attainment and people with a history of unemployment or underemployment.” (Misplaced Priorities, page 1)

During the last two decades, states across our nation have increased the amount of their discretionary spending in order to pay the cost of our seemingly ever-expanding prison systems.  This cost is one that is being seriously questioned by individuals and groups across a wide spectrum of political ideologies.

This PBS video clip features an interesting pairing of Benjamin Jealous, President of the NAACP and Grover Norquist a leading conservative advocate for tax reform.  The similarity of their views regarding the inappropriate use of tax revenues to pay for the cost of incarcerating large numbers of American citizens is noteworthy.

Watch the full episode. See more PBS NewsHour.