NATL: One in Every 100 Adults in Prison

Regular PSJ readers know that the United States leads the world in the amount of its population that’s behind bars, but a recent report by the Pew Center on the States reveals that one out of every 100 adults in the U.S. is behind bars.

Unlike the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics that compares the number of people in prisons and jails to the total number of people in the country (including children), the Pew Center focused on comparing the incarcerated adult population to the total adult population of the country.

The report also reveals that one out of every 54 men is incarcerated in this country. One in nine African American men ages 20 to 34, one in thirty-six Hispanic men 18 or over, and one out of every 106 white men is in prison or jail. One out of every 265 women ages 35 – 39 are incarcerated, one in every 100 African American women, one in every 297 Hispanic women, and one in 355 white women are incarcerated.

The report also compares incarceration rates per state and contains a lot of other useful information.

This report has been covered extensively in the media. You can read the full report, One in 100: Behind Bars in America 2008, on the Pew Center web site.

Here are links to other articles featuring the report:
U.S. Imprisons One in 100 Adults, Report Finds, New York Times
Editorial: Oregonians in Prison, The Oregonian
Prisons Lock in Chunk of Budget, The Oregonian

This news brief is based on the report, One in 100: Behind Bars in America 2008 from the Pew Center. If the link is broken, check the organization's web site.