Pew Center Study: One Percent Of U.S. Adults Behind Bars

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - It is not just gas and food prices and mortgage foreclosure rates that are soaring in the U.S. The country's prison population is also on an all time high, with one percent of American adults behind bars.

A Pew Center on the States report pointed out the U.S. has the largest number of people in prison. Among black males, the ratio was one in 15, while it was one in 35 for Hispanic men. Women prisoners also logged its highest rate of increase in 2006 compared to the previous five years. Bureau of Justice Statistics data said the spike in female inmates was felt mostly in Hawaii, North Dakota, Wyoming and Oklahoma.

In 1980 1.8 million were behind bars which cost federal and state governments $11 billion to maintain. By 2006, the numbers had ballooned to 7.2 million inmates and a whooping maintenance bill of $45 billion.

Ryan King, policy analyst of the Sentencing Project, compared the spiraling numbers to "a runaway train."

"Nobody's taking a step back and asking where all these billions of dollars are going," King told Washington Post, adding, "States need billions of dollars to build enough beds to catch up to where they need to be."

To address the growing federal and state prison headcount, various measures are underway including early release of offenders with non-threatening crimes.

A key factor to the growing number of prisoners was the availability and depth of sentencing guidelines. According to a study by the National Center for State Courts released in May, state sentencing guidelines were linked to predictability, lesser discrimination and higher transparency in sentencing.

Scott Thorpe, chief executive of the California District Attorneys Association, finds nothing wrong in the non-stop growth of the U.S. prison population. Thorpe explained to the Washington Post, "If you look at the fact that these people who are committing a crime, creating a danger to the public, you can't look at it as wrong."

He added, "What is the appropriate number of people to be incarcerated to ensure public safety? I don't know if you can answer that."